


fly high

by 99yeon



Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: F/F, a treasure box but for my fics, but you dont know whats in it, so a surprise garbage bin, so like a garbage bin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-03
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2018-12-23 10:01:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 53
Words: 42,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11987508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/99yeon/pseuds/99yeon
Summary: a twice-themed writing dump





	1. rumor

**Author's Note:**

> chapter 1: namo hp!au  
> chapter 2: namo domestic!au  
> chapter 3: nahyo demigod!au  
> chapter 4: namo vampire hunter!au  
> [M] chapter 5: namo omegaverse  
> chapter 6: nahyo pirate!au  
> chapter 7: namo omegaverse  
> chapter 8: jeongmo bounty hunter!au  
> chapter 9: nahyo vampire!au  
> chapter 10: nahyo runaway!au  
> chapter 11: nahyo goddess!au  
> chapter 12: satzu vampire!au  
> chapter 13: 3mix avatar!au  
> chapter 14: samoyeon slice of life!au  
> chapter 15: mihyun hs!au  
> chapter 16: minayeon bar!au  
> chapter 17: namo superhero!au  
> chapter 18: nayeon-centric supervillain!au  
> chapter 19: sahyo avatar!au  
> chapter 20: nahyo superhero!au  
> chapter 21: nahyo ??? au  
> chapter 22: sahyo magic!au  
> chapter 23: sanayeon/sajeong avatar!au  
> chapter 24: ot9 brooklyn 99 au  
> chapter 25: ot9 brooklyn 99 au  
> chapter 26: ot9 cult!au  
> chapter 27: sanayeon spy!au  
> chapter 28: 3mix detective!au  
> chapter 29: ot9/sanayeon detective!au  
> chapter 30: minayeon fluff  
> chapter 31: sanayeon vampire!au  
> chapter 32: minayeon reincarnation!au  
> chapter 33: ot9 au  
> chapter 34: sajeong/sachaeng au  
> chapter 35: namo messy bitch au  
> chapter 36: minayeon messy bitch au  
> chapter 37: sanayeon demigod au  
> chapter 38: nayeon-centric pirate au  
> chapter 39: sanayeon cop/journalist au  
> chapter 40: sajeong messy bitch au  
> chapter 41: ot9 avatar au  
> chapter 42: samo greek god au  
> chapter 43: nahyo cop au  
> chapter 44: sahyo pubg au  
> chapter 45: samo space au  
> chapter 46: samo tokyo ghoul au  
> chapter 47: sanayeon vamp au  
> chapter 48: 2na demigod au  
> chapter 49: sahyo gladiator au  
> chapter 50: sanayeon bending ?? au  
> chapter 51: samoyeon supernatural au  
> chapter 52: mimo greek god au  
> chapter 53: 3mix+samo murder mystery hs au

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hp!au. slytherin!nayeon x gryffindor!momo. momo is the best beater gryffindor has seen in years, and nayeon is testing the patience of her house. 382w

“it’d be better if you stopped trying to defend me. i can deal with my house on my own.“

momo grins up at her, smile crooked and eyes hazy. nayeon finds the way her heart flutters embarrassing. for someone who stared down the entire slytherin quidditch team after their  _idiot_ of a beater flung the bludger in the direction of the bleachers, nayeon’s heart is incredibly weak.

maybe her weakness has something to do with the way momo’s lip quirks up, or the way her neck has bruised in a way that nayeon’s annoyed to admit wasn’t her doing. the completely unnecessary band-aid nayeon had insisted momo put right above her eye after a ravenclaw seeker nicked her with his broom. 

or maybe it’s just the fact that it’s momo. 

"they could kill me, couldn’t they?”

“lots of them already want to.” this is no exaggeration - nayeon’s heard the low jeers of her house-mates, of how im nayeon is involved with a half-blood. a gryffindor half-blood, at that. she’s expecting a howler from her parents any one of these days to come berating her for betraying the family name. “but i wouldn’t let them. i’d kill them first.”

momo’s horned owl hoots haughtily from the corner, and momo nods in agreement. “godric thinks you’re being too cocky.”

nayeon’s eyes narrow, “tell godric to stick a-”  

“no,” momo chides, and nayeon pouts appropriately. 

there’s only a moment or so of reprieve before momo’s weight is on nayeon, the gryffindor’s hands threading themselves comfortably in nayeon’s hair. momo’s legs lock around nayeon’s hips as she bowls the two of them backwards, until nayeon’s face tingles with the touch of momo’s fiery mess of blonde hair. momo’s brown eyes are intense - but when are they not?

she sighs reverently, shushing whatever complaint nayeon was going to voice about messing up her hair. “you’re so pretty, you know that? especially when we’re alone. then you get so pretty that i’m not sure i’ll be able to control myself.”

“oh?” nayeon squeaks. 

“yeah,” momo breathes, leaning in, “and sometimes i don’t know if you’re  _really_  a slytherin, because you’re so eager and submissive when you’re with me.“   


“momo,” nayeon whines. “hurry it  _up_.”   


momo smiles devilishly before diving in, “maybe, just maybe, i don’t care.”   



	2. hot pink!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> domestic namo fluff. that's all tbh. 679w

Nayeon and Momo have fallen into this routine. It’s not really a routine, probably, since it’s nowhere like how Jeongyeon, when she and Momo were living together, used to march into the room and turn on all the lights in the morning to rouse Momo. Or like how Momo drops three sugar cubes into Nayeon’s mug in the morning, and gives her own cup only two. (Sugar is expensive, Momo rationalises.)

It’s less ordered, based more off their whims and fancies and current moods than the time on Momo’s baby blue alarm clock, or the way Nayeon likes her coffee. If a routine is characterized by these reliable characteristics, Momo concedes that what they have must not be a routine at all.

This is something else entirely, she decides. It comes when Nayeon’s in the mood, and truth be told, that’s one of the few deciding factors, because when Nayeon’s in the mood, so is Momo.

And Momo likes the reliability of that.

/

Nayeon comes to pick Momo up when her shift ends, in her black, money-glossed Lamborghini Aventador. She is fond of entrances, and money has never been a problem for her, so it seemed only natural for her to pick out such an attention-grabbing car.

Momo recalls going to pick it out with her - it’d caught Nayeon’s eye from the moment they walked into the dealership, and she’d only half-listened to what the sales rep was saying, her heart already fixated on the car. She’s goal-oriented, alright.

She never fails to appear in style. Today, it’s a display of her less-than-sensible driving skills, and a loud honk pierces the air, a pair of teenagers scurrying away as headlights make their way around the bend.

The car comes to a smooth, rumbling stop in front of Momo, the window scrolling down to reveal a grinning Nayeon. Her auburn hair is tied back into a ponytail, her head tilted as she greets Momo.

“What’s up?”

Momo nearly scrambles into the car, fumbling with the passenger door, and Nayeon laughs evenly as she gets in. They take off, Nayeon rounding the bend to get on the main road as she asks about Momo’s day, about how work was today. (Nayeon’s a fashion consultant for a big-name talent agency in the heart of the city, but she rarely needs to be in the office anyway, and it’s not like she doesn’t like playing chauffeur to Momo. It makes both of them happy.)

Momo shrugs. “Boring as usual.”

She gives the same reply every evening when Nayeon comes to pick her up from her workplace. It’s a little cafe in the Dongdaemun area that’s constantly packed, tourists and highschoolers alike undeterred by the sheer (lack of) size of the cafe. Momo spends her days taking orders and shouting them back to Dahyun and Chaeyoung, her coworkers and close friends.  

“Hm.” Nayeon laces her long fingers with Momo’s as they stop at a red light, keeping her right hand on the steering wheel. Momo tries not to giggle too much, squirming in the seat beside Nayeon. “Any way I can help with that?”

“Let’s have dinner first,” Momo says, and the light goes green. Nayeon steps on the gas, but doesn’t untangle her fingers from Momo’s where they’re resting on the gear shift right away. “Dine me before you bed me.”

Nayeon pouts, finally pulling away from Momo and making an adorable sound of assent. She takes a familiar turn in the direction of where Momo’s favourite black pork place is, and Momo feels unbelievably happy, like she’s soaring high above the city. It’s great.

“Love you,” Nayeon murmurs, soft as always, to allow for deniability if Momo talks about it.

  
(They’re falling into something like a routine.)

“I love you too,” Momo says.  

(It’s not a real routine, not like how Nayeon picks her up at 7.30 after she gets off work, not like how Nayeon takes her to bed night after night without fail.)

She likes things just the way they are, here together with Nayeon.  

(Momo  _loves_  it.)  


	3. rain & lightning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> nahyo greek god au. jihyo, the head counselor at camp half-blood, finds a new camper. 447w

She doesn’t get paid enough for this.

Jihyo pushes through the swelling crowd of campers, some of them helpfully jostling their friends to get out of the way as well (to which Jihyo is thankful). Most, however, don’t get the memo, and Jihyo has to press through them herself.

Under normal circumstances, they would split like the Red Sea being parted to form a clear path for Jihyo. Jihyo’s always had that sort of authority over the campers, whether it may be because she’s a head counselor or because of the whole  _daughter of Zeus_ thing she has going on, and it’s useful when she needs to rein in the general state of chaos that the camp is usually in.

These aren’t normal circumstances, clearly. There are dozens of campers blocking her way to the epicentre of the disturbance, and Jihyo can’t even see that far. All she knows is that they’re clustered around something (or someone), and that it’s something big.

“Sorry,” She murmurs, patting Dahyun’s shoulder to pass her. Dahyun grunts absently, her head turned towards the source of the commotion. Jihyo feels irritation tug at her - what could be so important? She can feel herself being drawn to the source of the chaos, like an instinctual reaction, and it worries her. It must be something big, if even she’s affected by this.

There’s a sharp bang, and then the smell of charred flesh fills the air, too fast for Jihyo to register. A pale greenish light appears up ahead, shimmering and glowing brightly, even in the broad daylight. Campers to scramble back in shock.

The bad feeling in Jihyo’s gut grows stronger.

“Move,” she orders, finished with being pushed back by the younger campers. She shoves her way to the front, her job made easier by the fact that no one wants to be near the epicentre of the commotion now. As she gets closer, she thinks she can make out what exactly is going on.

There’s a girl sitting on the ground, knees tucked to her chest and staring straight ahead, ignoring the noise around her. The light hovering over her head is unmistakable. It’s the claiming insignia of a god. Jihyo recognizes which god it is instantly - how could she not, when she’d done years and years of research into the insignias while waiting to be claimed?

  
This is bad. Jihyo had read up on every piece of literature about claiming that existed, and there hadn’t been any information on  _this_ sort of demigod. Except that all the books had claimed one thing -

_The appearance of a child of Hades is an omen that destruction and disaster are imminent._


	4. spinning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> namo vampire hunter au. 1269w

They have a routine that’s well established by now, after years and years of being in the business. Aim, shoot, clean up. Well, it’s Nayeon’s routine, at least – Momo remains more comfortable with bullets over silver-tipped arrows, the manner of execution the vampire gods intended their species to fall victim to. She supposes that half of the thrill Nayeon gets from being a hunter comes with pulling her bloodied arrows from their necks.

The other half comes from the suspense of the occupation. It’s what had charmed Momo into throwing her lot in with Nayeon so many years ago. It gets boring when things are slow and they haven’t spotten their target in weeks - vampires are elusive creatures - but the hours, minutes, seconds leading up to a kill are the most exciting, and always pay off. She runs off the adrenaline for weeks.

Momo fiddles with the cross hanging around her neck. It doesn’t work (the idea that vampires are susceptible to even the cheapest hunks of metal shaped into crosses is ridiculous) in keeping vampires away, but she wears it as a personal promise, that she’ll fulfil the supposed power of the cross with her own ability. Sometimes, it’s the only thing she has.

Beside her, Nayeon lets out a controlled breath, wary of startling the vampire hiding in the shadow of the hulking tree. Her arm is still, arrow nocked and ready to fire. Nayeon is the perfect picture of a ruthless hunter, focused and closing in for the kill she so desperately craves. She’d be drooling if she were a lesser woman.

Blood rushes in Momo’s ears. Nayeon shifts, and Momo counts down in her head silently. Excitement forces a buzz through her veins, and she can’t help but grin in the darkness to herself.

  
All vampires follow a pattern, even if they think they don’t. The children of the night have never been good at concealing their tactics, and people like Momo and Nayeon have taken advantage of that.  

 _One_ ,  _two…_

The vampire rushes Nayeon, silhouette blurring as he gets closer to them, but Nayeon reacts faster, letting the arrow fly, having another nocked before Momo can even blink. It goes wide - to which neither of them are surprised - and slams into the tree beside the now-sprinting vampire.

  
The next arrow does not. It gives a solid  _thunk_ as it buries itself in the vampire’s chest, and he slows immediately, toppling over his feet and crumpling to the ground.

Momo draws her gun, looking to Nayeon, and the other girl shakes her head.

“I’ll finish this on my own.” And she does, firing another arrow into the dead vampire’s neck.  

-

Not all vampires are easy kills. The young ones, the ones who break away from their clans and try to eke it out in the world on their own, fall easily. They’re young and innocent and unable to deal with humans who know them better than they know themselves, and lose their bravado when they stumble upon hunters armed to the teeth.

But they don’t make up much of the vampire population. Most rogue vampires know hunters intimately, how they operate, and how to take them down. Some leave hunters alone, disappearing and relocating (a skill vampires excel at) where they won’t be found the moment they know of a hunter presence. Those are the ones Momo and Nayeon don’t go after. They don’t cause much trouble and are pretty much untrackable, so they let them go.

Again, they’re a minority of the population. Most rogue vampires - and vampires as a whole - detest and actively look to kill vampire hunters. It’s part of the reason why they can never be in the same town for too long, lest they draw vampires to them. Vampires and vampire hunters have always existed in a tentative balance, each seeking the other out and pulling them into deadly battles, from which only one party emerges from.

  
(Spoiler: It’s not always the hunters who win.)  

-

Surprisingly, Nayeon is not as cold-blooded as she might appear to be. She’s simply… controlled, professional. There hasn’t been a situation where she’s been unhinged, except for  _that_ incident. She’s as professional as they come, and it’s why she’s managed to outlive the typical vampire hunter lifespan by years. Her hand is forever steady, her eyes forever focused, weapon forever loaded and ready to fire.

She loses that controlled front whenever she’s away from the job. On the nights where they manage to settle down long enough to get a room in a motel and rest in somewhere that isn’t their car, Nayeon is soft as they come, whiny and pliant in Momo’s arms. It’s relief from who she is normally, as the layers of armour come off one by one. Momo likes it more than anything.

Nayeon’s a good kisser, full pouty lips coming to interlock with Momo when everything’s said and done at the end of the day. She goes from soft, when they’ve had an uneventful day, to rough and passionate, when both of them are still running off the high of the kill. 

Momo wouldn’t want to spend this with anyone else. Nayeon is more than a partner to her - she’s practically the same person Momo is now.

-

Momo slams the trunk of the car closed, dropping her hand to her belt to smooth her shirt over the gun in its holster. It’s warm and almost unnoticeable against her. That’s a good sign - tonight’s second kill will be clean, no frills. Tonight has been mostly uneventful, the young vampire they had gunned down earlier dying without much ceremony or resistance, and she intends to keep it that way.

“The crypt is over there,” Nayeon murmurs, setting a hand on Momo’s shoulder. Momo squints through the ominous fog to look for what Nayeon’s talking about, and locates the crypt. The graveyard is no more than ten metres from where their Jeep’s been parked, the spacious crypt marked by an above-ground monument.

Cheery. Why can’t vampires hang around clubs, or five-star hotels instead of graveyards?

The chill in the air is unmistakable, one that confirms that they’re in the presence of a vampire. It seeps through the expensive material of Momo’s jacket, sultry and cloying, and she shivers. The stronger, older vampires are usually the ones with this sort of scent and aura. That can’t be a good thing.

They’d received this call on short notice. Jeongyeon had called from out of town, told them about the latest rogue vampire.  _Some sort of vampire princess,_  she’d said, going on to describe how she and her partner Chaeyoung had the vampire narrowed down, but they had to leave town to do some work and they couldn’t just let the vamp go, could they?

 _She’s a menace,_ Jeongyeon had remarked,  _Killed and drained the sheriff and his entire family in one night. Laid their bodies out in the town square for everyone to gawk at._

Momo’s chest had tightened the moment Jeongyeon was done explaining the atrocities that the vampire’s committed, and had practically begged Nayeon to take on this case. Not as if Nayeon was hesitant to - she has a soft spot for children, and always gets more riled up than usual when they’re brought into the equation.

“She’s strong,” Nayeon notes, coming to the same set of conclusions as Momo. The silver charm around her neck reflects moonlight off it.

“Yeah,” Momo agrees, biting her lip. She hopes she doesn’t look as nervous as she feels. “But so are we.” 


	5. write our names in the wet concrete

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> alpha!nayeon x omega!momo namo omegaverse. nayeon goes into rut. pwp. 866w

This isn’t how her morning routine was supposed to go, but she’s not complaining. She gets up specially early just for this reason, because Nayeon likes initiating morning sex and Momo is just as enthusiastic about it, but something’s undeniably  _different_ about this morning.

Nayeon’s hand slips in between Momo’s legs, stroking  _hard_ and pushing them apart gently. There’s an undercurrent of impatience even through Nayeon’s calm actions, and Momo gets the feeling that Nayeon would prefer for things to speed up just about now. Nayeon’s mouth is hot on her neck, biting down gently before sucking, and Momo whimpers.

She can smell Nayeon, her alpha’s scent thick in the air, and it’s driving her crazy. It smells like strawberries, and Momo would want nothing more but Nayeon to mark her, to fuck her senseless right now.

But there’s none of the burn that comes with her heat between her legs. She’s not in heat, that’s for sure. (It came and went a week ago, and Nayeon helped her through it dutifully.) She’s turned on - how could she not be? - but something’s… different.

Nayeon groans into her ear, low and sensual and Momo nearly comes on the spot. The alpha’s hand is still rubbing her gently, making Momo weak at the knees, and her scent thickens with every passing second, strawberries and cream and sweetness so strong Momo wants to fall into it.   
  
“God,” Nayeon rasps, “I want you.”

Momo’s almost fully bent over against the counter now, Nayeon’s front pressed against her back, and Momo can’t help but notice how warm Nayeon is. Her hips grind against Momo’s ass, nothing but a gentle brush before it intensifies, and Nayeon moans.

“You’re so good for me,” Nayeon murmurs, biting Momo’s earlobe. She’s tugging feverishly at the waist of Momo’s sleep pants now, and that’s when it clicks - there’s only one reason why Nayeon would be this desperate, this eager to take Momo. She’s usually more measured, confident as she takes Momo.   
  
“I’m all yours,” Momo promises, and Nayeon positively  _growls_ , fully in the throes of her rut. She’s so needy for once, brief respite from the needy omega role Momo usually makes a point to live up to, and Momo loves it. She’s not like this often, which makes everything even sweeter.

Nayeon is a big talker during sex, but for now she’s quiet, nipping at the back of Momo’s neck, sucking gently and leaving bruises Momo will wear around proudly after this. She presses her cheek against Momo’s neck, and the omega trembles from where she’s pressed down on the counter. She can feel their scents mixing, can smell how good Nayeon and her are together.   
  
She makes a few incoherent sounds, a mix between moans and feral growls as she marks Momo, one hand on Momo’s waist and the other slipping into her soaked panties. She feels like a tidal wave, crashing down on Momo with an intensity that Momo positively adores.

Momo’s heart swells as Nayeon bites down, teeth ghosting over the marks she’d left so many years ago. A delightful shiver runs through her, and she moans out, wanting Nayeon inside her, she’s almost as needy as Nayeon is now and she just wants Nayeon to fill her. Wants to make her happy, wants to make her feel good, because Momo knows Nayeon gets so much of her happiness from her pleasure and she just to be good.  

She grinds back needily into her alpha, something unintelligible but probably filthy falling from her lips, and Nayeon goes straight for it, slipping into her and stretching her out easily with how wet she is. Two fingers scissor gently in her, and Momo  _screams_.

“You’re so good,” Nayeon repeats, soothing the bite marks on Momo’s neck with her tongue and lips as she thrusts heavily into Momo. Momo can feel slick dripping down her legs, and it’s making Nayeon’s breathing more laboured. “I love you. You’re so, so good for me, aren’t you? Hm?”

“Y-Yes!”

Nayeon hums, eyes dark as she moves to flip Momo over, fingers withdrawing and making Momo whine, so that Momo’s back is to the countertop. Momo’s thighs bracket Nayeon’s hips automatically, and the alpha growls softly.

She looks as if she wants to drop to her knees to eat Momo out, but she holds back, cupping Momo’s face in her hand. Her thumb slips into Momo’s mouth, and Momo sucks on it dutifully, eyes crinkling as she beams up at Nayeon. She looks so proud of herself, and it flips a switch inside of Nayeon.

In a flash, she’s nearly on top of Momo, bending down to bite more bruises into her neck as she thrusts three fingers into Momo this time. Momo’s nearly screaming, but she doesn’t care, she just wants the world to know that Momo is hers. It might be the rut speaking, but she doesn’t care about that either.

“Unnie,” Momo whimpers, fingers scoring lines down Nayeon’s back as Nayeon continues pumping into her. Her back is tilted back to give Nayeon access to her neck, and all Nayeon can think about is how pliant Momo is for her,  _just_ for her.  


	6. the last of the real ones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ot9 pirate au. includes nahyo. 1673w

Dahyun is restless.

A natural-born navigator, she has never been able to stay in one place for too long, or busy herself with one person for more than she deems exciting. But this goes deeper than her disgust with commitment - the bigger thing is that they’ve been docked at this port for a full week already, and don’t seem to be moving any time soon.

Even Sana, the newest member of their ship and also their boatswain, would prefer to leave as soon as possible. Being this close to land for this long a time makes them all uncomfortable - the sea has been their home more than land has. It feels toxic and suffocating, as if it’s trying to entrap Dahyun and drag her back to the home she’d escaped from.  

Dahyun wishes she could burst into the captain’s quarters and demand that they set sail immediately. Jihyo wouldn’t mind, would probably laugh at Dahyun’s indignance, but Dahyun knows that Nayeon would never stand for it. Their quartermaster and second-in-command is a stickler for seniority and respect, and as their oldest member, she makes it a point to uphold these standards. Her ferocious protectiveness of Jihyo doesn’t help.

Which is why Dahyun is currently slumped over an aged wooden desk, several different maps sprawled out and her pen working over a piece of parchment in the middle of it all. Yesterday, Chaeyoung had returned with a rucksack stuffed with medical supplies and a few beautifully designed maps for Dahyun, passing them to her as soon as she was done putting away the medical supplies. (Jeongyeon had whined about Chaeyoung not getting her anything for an hour.) Dahyun can’t hope to understand the language of this colony and what the foreign words mean, but she can understand the lines on the map, not dissimilar from her sailing chart. Hopefully, it distracts from the fact that she wants to set sail  _right now._

“Slept well?”   
  
Dahyun jerks, swivelling in her chair to glare at Sana playfully. “What have I told you about not scaring me like that?” Sana has ghostly light footsteps, and delights in sneaking up on her shipmates with frightening frequency.

Sana’s leaning up again the doorway, smirking at Dahyun, “Don’t be dramatic, Dahyunnie, that was hardly scary.”

She comes closer, making grabby hands for Dahyun, but Dahyun scowls and ducks. “Don’t come any closer, I don’t want your sticky hands on me.”

“Me? Sticky?” Sana pouts, even they both know she is. Her skin is shimmering with sweat from having toiled in the hull of the ship for hours, living up to the title of the most skilled boatswain they’ve had in years. She and Dahyun aren’t too different - both busy themselves to distract from the boredom of reality.

Dahyun swivels back to stare at her charts. Sana appears behind her like a force of nature a moment later. Soft hands land on her shoulders, and Dahyun’s vision blurs with exhaustion as they begin to knead the knots in her shoulders. She can never sleep well when the ship is anchored to land, and it shows, more than any of them can explain. She feels like a fish out of water.

“Your hands are sticky,” Dahyun murmurs defenselessly, aching into Sana’s touch with an exhale.   
  
“You’re not complaining,” Sana says back, and really, Dahyun isn’t.

-

Mina and Tzuyu eat in silence opposite each other, bowls of chicken broth staying untouched as they devour the soft-shelled crab (lauded as a signature dish and a must-try by the inhabitants of the island). They’d opted to eat out after a day of scouting the island, picking up knick-knacks here and there for their shipmates.

They’ve been friends for a long time, long before they met Jihyo and the rest of the crew, and things have always been… simple between them. Neither of them are big talkers, but Mina knows that Tzuyu would be (and has been) there for her in a heartbeat. Her loyalty makes her an invaluable asset.

Tzuyu dips her wooden spoon into the broth and grimaces upon tasting it. “Momo could do better.”

  
Mina snorts and takes a sip of the broth, mirroring Tzuyu’s distaste for it. She can’t help but think of Momo’s dishes, how she’d rip the chef who made this broth a new one if she could get her hands on him. Momo probably could’ve become a professional chef if she didn’t choose to join the crew, but that would’ve meant a huge loss for all of them, because Momo is more than useful.  

She wonders how Momo’s going to use the various spices they picked up at the local market. Some of them smell downright disgusting, and Mina had been dangerously close to vomiting when she caught the whiff of a particularly potent bottle of spice, but Tzuyu had convinced her to buy it anyway. Momo has a good eye (tongue?) for which spices to blend together to make delicious dishes. If anything, it’s the same way how she bonds the crew - no one would’ve  _ever_ thought that Nayeon and Jeongyeon would get along, at least, not before Momo came along.

Then again, lots of things were different before Momo came along.

-

The duties of the quartermaster are simple, and Nayeon has never thought of failing to complete them.

Make sure everything is running as they should be.

Make sure everyone is working as they should be.

Make sure the captain is happy - as she should be.

Failing any of these would be failing the crew, the ship, and the captain, and Nayeon can’t have that, because it would be like failing herself. It scares her to even think about it. At the end of the day,  _she’s_ the leader of the crew when Jihyo takes a backseat, and makes sure everything is running smoothly when Jihyo is busy.

  
She’s no stranger to how the younger members of the crew feel about her. Dahyun and Tzuyu are prickly around her, keeping her at an arm’s length. She doesn’t blame them, though - someone has to be the bad guy, and she would rather it be her than anyone else, or (God forbid) Jihyo.

Jihyo shifts in her sleep, nuzzling deeper into the crook of Nayeon’s neck as she presses against the quartermaster’s back, as if she knows that Nayeon’s thinking about her. The leg that’s been thrown around Nayeon’s hip tightens, and they’re brought closer. Nayeon marvels at how easily Jihyo had fallen asleep - it’s not even close to dusk yet, but Jihyo had convinced Nayeon to take a languid midday nap with her, more for her own benefit than Nayeon’s.

Nayeon feels an age-old ache in her bones. The ship is rocking gently, the tides smooth and malleable today, and Nayeon hates it. She wants a storm, wants to change things.

She wants to leave this place.

-

Jeongyeon sets the keg of rum down with a huff, Momo humming appreciatively. No one can cook quite as well as Momo, but some tasks don’t require skill as they do brute strength. Jeongyeon has neither.

“Here,” Momo gestures to the sink, “You can wash the vegetables while I start cooking.” She’d taken one look at the ingredients Mina and Tzuyu had brought back onboard and declared that they’d have a stir-fry tonight, just like they do in her hometown. Momo hails from a sleepy fishing village somewhere in the Ajax Sea, and brought with her many of her family’s passed-down recipes onto the ship. Stir-fries are her specialty.

Momo fires up the stoves, putting the huge pot of soup at a slow boil and dumping oil into a huge wok. Jeongyeon gets to work on rinsing the vegetables in the sink, shivering in anticipation of tonight’s dinner. She feels a little more useful now, helping Momo prepare dinner - which is something she can’t say about the previous days.

Jihyo had told them to wait, that they’d leave port in a few days. Jeongyeon had waited those few days, and then grown agitated when Jihyo had continued to give cryptic responses. She wants to trust her captain, and she  _knows_ she does. She trusts Jihyo with her entire life. But it’s grinding her gears to not know something and to know that Jihyo’s keeping something from her. It reminds her of home, of being left on land and deserted by the crew of her past.

Jeongyeon blinks hard, the water suddenly scorching over the skin of her hands.   
  
Sometimes, it feels like she’d never stopped waiting.

-

Chaeyoung enjoys the company of her shipmates, but what she treasures the most is sitting on deck with her medical supplies, sorting through them as she sits near the cannons Tzuyu and Mina man when they’re at sea. It makes her feel at peace, being able to watch the hustle and bustle of the port from where she’s sitting while still tending to her own business.

There’s a ship closing in on the port, presumably to dock, and Chaeyoung glances at it for a moment before setting another roll of bandages in the correct compartment. The sun is setting soon, and the island is winding down for the day, which makes the appearance of this ship unsurprising. Most ships come into the harbour to dock for a night to rest, restock and do business before leaving in the morning.

A cannon goes off in the distance, and Chaeyoung’s heart sinks.

The ship isn’t slowing down. Its cannons are pointed straight towards the port, and several of them go off at the same time.

The Jolly Roger grins down at Chaeyoung, and as the first few cannonballs slam into the port, she hears screaming. She can see the gunners of the ship - there’s close to a dozen of them, and all of them load and man the guns with frightening accuracy and speed - moving like a well-oiled machine.

“Jihyo,” she whispers, before running off-deck in the direction of the captain’s quarters, “Jihyo!”  


	7. chocolate love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> omegaverse, non smut. namo. 583w

jeongyeon brings a new friend to their table on a chilly friday night, sitting her down opposite momo and pulling her into the booth. she - nayeon - is shy and has hair sweeping into her eyes. she must know that this is something out of the ordinary, that their friend group has never had someone new like this be brought to them.

(sana isn’t discreet about checking nayeon out, and momo rolls her eyes, but she can’t really blame her - this friend is  _something_.)  

“you smell like chocolate,” nayeon blurts out, blushing hard a moment later. jeongyeon crows, and the newly-introduced alpha buries her face in her hands, “sorry, that sounded better in my head.”

alphas are notorious for speaking their minds, but not so much for being apologetic about it. this is something new, certainly. momo is more amused than interested.

but still - she squirms in her seat, all too aware of why nayeon’s so aware of her scent. if she leans back, relaxes a little, she can feel the beginnings of the ache between her legs. she’s been meaning to get her suppressants for a while now, was actually planning to do it tonight before sana texted that she was outside her apartment with jeongyeon.

jeongyeon - blissfully mated and the oblivious alpha she is - can’t tell, and neither can sana, who’s an omega through and through. but it’s obvious that nayeon is all too attuned to it, and momo feels her cheeks burn.

“really?” jeongyeon takes an obnoxiously loud sniff, and nayeon looks like she wishes she could die on the spot. “i don’t smell anything.”

“uh.” nayeon looks away.

jeongyeon shrugs, “it must be the air.”  

sana doesn’t stop winking at nayeon throughout their first round of drinks, and nayeon doesn’t stop looking uncomfortable at momo’s scent, which she’s definitely feeling the full brunt of.

poor nayeon, momo thinks. but that’s the price you pay for being an alpha.

-

“hey.”

momo sidles up to nayeon, slinging an arm across her shoulder and pressing close to her in what she hopes is threatening.

the alpha flinches noticeably - she’s been keeping a safe distance from both sana and momo the entire night, nursing a coke and nothing else as sana got positively fucking hammered. she’d watched jeongyeon get drunk, too, and had dutifully taken the cup out of her friend’s hand when jeongyeon tripped over her own feet.

momo, not so much. a part of her is still wary of nayeon, and she would rather that she  _not_ see momo get drunk on their first meeting. certainly not after she pointed out the fact that momo is two steps into her heat. she’s a little buzzed, but not that much, and that’s what matters, right? 

“don’t touch sana,” momo mumbles, and clears her throat to repeat it in case nayeon didn’t hear, “do not touch sana, no matter how pretty she is. she’s drunk and that’d be a-”

“i would never,” nayeon says quickly, quietly. her two front teeth peek out when she speaks, and momo can’t help but find it endearing, the indignant response that nayeon has. she’s kind of lost in her own head now, and she really,  _really_ wants to be driven home and flop into sana’s soft cushions and sleep for maybe a year, suppressants and her heat be damned-

“good,” momo slurs, “that makes you different,” and the last thing she feels is nayeon’s arms coming to wrap around her.


	8. we like

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jeongmo bounty hunter au. 369w

"Im Nayeon," Momo reads out carefully, thumbing her finger over the woman's face on the screen. The bounty hanging - literally - over her head a is a hefty seven digits, and Momo would be lying if she said she wasn't automatically drawn to this contract. As is every other bounty hunter in this part of the Solar System. "What did she do?"

 

"Led the Deimos Uprising from 3201 to 3206, and fled to an unknown planet when Phobos forces stormed her stronghold," Jeongyeon whistles, scrolling, "Executed every one of her bodyguards via airlock when she discovered that one of them was a double agent. Current location: Somewhere on Saturn? They don't care if she's brought back dead or alive. Damn, this woman is crazy."

 

"We have to take this contract," Momo urges. Both of them know this. It's their last-ditch attempt, their last shot at keeping their careers.

 

They haven't secured any targets in God knows how long, and their benefactors are starting to get... testy. Several of them have already pulled their support, citing newer and more efficient bounty hunters that produced more results. The two of them can't afford to lose any more.

 

Jeongyeon runs her hair through her hair, staring at the contract for a long moment - to the point where Momo is worried that she might say _no, let's pick someone else, this will be too hard_. A part of Momo is tempted to do the same - what are the odds that they'll find this intergalactic criminal before anyone else can? They might just be better off retiring to become ship engineers on the Moon colony, maybe the Mars colony if they can make it. Bounty hunting isn't a viable career anyway.

 

But at the back of her mind, Momo knows that it won't be the case. It's why they set out together in the first place - because Momo knows Jeongyeon like the back of her hand, knows her reckless courage and determination all too well. She has never been able to turn down a good fight, and this is no different.

 

"Let's do it, then," Jeongyeon declares, pushing the throttle and laughing boisterously when Momo grips the edge of her seat. "We're back in business!"


	9. i just

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> nahyo vampire au + idolverse. 884w

She knows that she would be dropped into a pit of stakes if the other vampires in the clan knew what they were doing. Their position, the nature of where they are necessitates it, but that doesn't change the fact that it's humiliating and unbecoming of a vampire to do so. What would they say? Would they find it humorous, or would they be immediately disgusted?

(Nayeon tells her not to worry about it, but Jihyo can't help  _but_ worry.)

-

The first few months are spent learning how to live in this climate, of course. It'd been different when she was a trainee, and she made the rookie mistake of assuming that ten years of hiding it would prepare her for idol life. Idol life is obnoxious, boisterous and in-your-face, something that Jihyo has never appreciated. It's stressful to have to worry about getting found out, and Jihyo spends the first few months, before everything ramps up, trying to get used to it.

She develops habits, patterns to cover up her tracks - she never leaves the dorm before 2AM in the morning (Jeongyeon is a night owl, and caught Jihyo as she was trying to leave more times than Jihyo would like), always brings breathspray before she returns, and keeps track of her excuses so she doesn't attribute staining her clothes with blood to her period twice in a month. They give some measure of comfort in those first few months, help her build a routine that is safe and guarantees her cover.  

  
She looks at Nayeon and wonders if she has an easier time covering it up. Nayeon basks in the attention that being an idol brings, doesn't even seem to flinch when cameras are pointed too close to her face. Doesn't she worry about them seeing the coloured contacts painstakingly and painfully applied in the mornings, or the beginnings of sharp fangs where her canines should be? Nayeon seems to look past that, and bear the biggest grin her face can muster, until everyone is sure that Nayeon was born to be an idol.

Jihyo? Not so much. She flinches from the camera when it comes too close, retreats into herself when she hasn't fed.

God, that might just be the worst part -- the feeding.

-

"There you go," Nayeon murmurs, tugging gently on Jihyo's hair to pull her away. Her touch is soft, and so is her voice, velvet sweet as she guides Jihyo's head away from her throat. Blood dribbles down her neck, but she doesn't seem to mind, "Feel better?"

"Barely," Jihyo croaks, licking the excess blood off her teeth. Her fangs are unnaturally sharp, and the puncture marks in Nayeon's neck that they've left behind are hideous. Nothing that can't be covered with makeup, of course, but still hideous. She swallows the last of the blood, and feels warmth course through her body - which is second only to the shame. "I'm sorry."

Nayeon raises a perfectly drawn brow, but she doesn't look surprised. She looks disappointed, as if she knew this would happen. Because it does, every single time they do this. Jihyo hates it, hates that she needs it so bad.

"You have nothing to be sorry for, babe." The marks on Nayeon's neck have begun to seal up, leaving behind only faint indentations, and Jihyo audibly relaxes at the sight. She aches into Nayeon's touch, nuzzling close to her. She's still propped up on Nayeon's lap, and she adjusts accordingly.   
  
They stay like this for exactly thirty-two minutes (Jihyo counts) before Nayeon takes in a shaky breath. She knows what it is - Nayeon wants to say something, but won't if she knows that it's going to hurt Jihyo. It's one of her more maddening traits.

"You need to feed soon."   
  
"I just did," Jihyo protests weakly, but Nayeon shakes her head.

"You know what I mean, babe," Nayeon says worriedly, "You can't survive drinking from me, and you  _know_ I love the feeling of your teeth in me but-"

  
"-but it's not sustainable," Jihyo says glumly. "I know."

-

It's not always Jihyo drinking from Nayeon, though, because as much as Nayeon 'loves the feeling of your teeth in me', she also loves staking her claim over what's hers, which means her on top of Jihyo most nights, nuzzling against her neck as she bites impatiently, searching for her pulse point, where Jihyo's most vulnerable.

Sometimes, though not all the time, Nayeon looks up with ferocious eyes (she still manages to look like she's in love with Jihyo, but she's so  _hungry_  and she could just lose herself to the hunger but she doesn't), tongue and lips and teeth as she stakes out the curve of Jihyo's throat. The clan would have her burnt at the stake if she knew that Jihyo bears her throat for another vampire, that she gives herself this freely to another member of the clan. It's so taboo, so deadly that she should never have done this.

But she's never been able to say no, has never  _wanted_ to say no.

So she locks eyes with Nayeon, lets Nayeon nip at her neck gently until the older girl's fangs properly sink into her. And that's all she remembers most nights, the feeling of Nayeon inside her, gentle and pliant as she drinks greedily.  


	10. run with me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> there are some things they can't forget. 339w nahyo

They get off the train at dawn, and quickly find an inn where no one will find them after about an hour's walk, checking in under fake names and fake identification. Nayeon half-jokes about burning off her fingerprints when they see the fireplace crackling in the lobby, "to make sure the job is really done".

 

Combined (Jihyo pretends most of it doesn't come from Nayeon), they have more than enough to sustain them for a while. The inn is respectable and clean, and their room overlooks a foggy courtyard that Nayeon talks about going to when they have the chance. It's times like these where Jihyo is thankful that Nayeon comes from money.

  
They settle their backpacks on the ground - well, Nayeon does. She opens up the baggage, prepares some new sets of clothes for them to change into as Jihyo sinks back into the mattress lethargically. The night on the train had been bumpy and turbulent, and her joints are aching from having to compress her body into a space the size of half a bunk bed.

 

"-Jihyo?" A bolt of alarm strikes her and she sits up, staring at Nayeon in an unspoken question.

 

Nayeon is crouched beside Jihyo's backpack, looking more alarmed than Jihyo feels from the sudden reaction. In her hands she holds Jihyo's leather wallet, worn at the corners. Plastic peeks out from the sides -- credit cards that will never find their use again. But that's not what Nayeon's talking about - it's the dusted polaroid stuck into one of the compartments, that Nayeon is looking to Jihyo for guidance with.

 

"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you up. I, uh, was going to ask what I should do with this." There's a pile of stuff beside Nayeon, consisting of their mobile phones and Nayeon's wallet, things that they'll have to dispose of.

 

Jihyo swallows past the tight lump in her throat.

 

"Burn it."

 

Nayeon's eyes widen, "Are you sure? I know-"

 

"I said burn it," Jihyo repeats, and buries her face into the pillow.

 


	11. flash

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jihyo wants the one thing she can't have. 723w

she's discovered a new feeling, jihyo decides as she re-traces her steps back into the gentle light of her home. something between abject annoyance and anger. it's an ugly feeling, curling in her ribcage and threatening to slither out.

 

she ignores the banging sounds when nayeon starts pounding on the door again, because this is nayeon at her worst, and she is _not_ keen on staying to relive it. for now, she's safe in the knowledge that nayeon has no choice but to remain outside. this is jihyo's domain, after all.

 

jihyo walks over to the countertop, picking up her abandoned mug of coffee. there's another mug less than a foot from the first, steaming hot and black.

 

just the way nayeon likes it.

 

jihyo narrows her eyes - when did nayeon become this powerful? there isn't a nook or cranny in jihyo's apartment that escapes the light, so there is no way nayeon should be able to manifest in here. just to make sure, jihyo rubs her fingers together, focusing her energy into brightening the place up. nothing.

 

she looks up - there's still a swirling cloud of dark energy at her front door, and jihyo can already feel her strength being sapped. she can only hope that she has the same effect on nayeon. there is no give without take, after all.

 

"i know you're there," jihyo says, raising her voice. the haze at her doorstep doesn't move, only continues swirling in a way that is so characteristically nayeon.

 

"i'm not trying to hide," nayeon replies, and it's with a sense of finality that jihyo sighs.

 

she snaps her fingers. the lights in the house go off, and when she rubs her fingers together again, nayeon is standing in front of her.

 

"nayeon." jihyo can already feel herself grow irritable. nayeon soaks up the light, and none of it seems to bounce off her, only sink into her very being. it doesn't make any sense - it never has. she feels constantly threatened around nayeon, as if nayeon is about to snuff her out. she could, jihyo thinks. she could do whatever she want if she put her mind to it.

 

nayeon reaches out for jihyo's hand. jihyo watches as darkness runs over her fingers, flirting with the light that emanates from jihyo's before they beat a hasty retreat. and this is how jihyo lets nayeon touch her - the older girl's long fingers skim over jihyo's hand, sending shocks through it. jihyo hates how she instinctively leans into the touch, as if she's never been had physical contact with someone else before. it's pathetic, and unbecoming of her.

 

nayeon is cold, just like the darkness she represents.

 

jihyo can't forgive that.

 

"when will you stop hating me?" nayeon murmurs, moving closer, closer, closer. her lips are warm, tantalizing, and jihyo knows her base instincts would want nothing more than to lean in.

 

but she isn't her base instincts. she's the goddess of light, and she can't _be_ with another goddess. let alone one who dabbles in darkness, the one thing jihyo can never have.

 

"i don't," jihyo exhales. nayeon's lips brush against the curve of her jaw, and jihyo feels her self-control being stripped away. she wants the darkness to consume her, play with her, she wants to be _nayeon_ 's. jihyo hates that she has to keep pushing nayeon away, to keep telling herself that she can't have nayeon. powers greater than themselves have established this, and jihyo knows that she can have everything _but_ nayeon. it's just how things are.

 

and yet, she can't settle for this. because the way nayeon moves to kiss her is warm and sets fire to her entire being. her fingers curl around the back of jihyo's neck, pulling her closer, and jihyo feels like liquid as she surges up to meet her lips. nayeon whispers a few words in a language that predates the dawn of humanity, and the darkness expands around them, enveloping them. jihyo is the sole light in this inky blackness, and it's making nayeon frustrated, heady and passionate. everything that jihyo isn't.

 

it burns when she kisses nayeon, but she can't fault her for this. because as the lights flicker, a tell-tale sign of jihyo having lost control and giving in to nayeon once again... she knows she only has herself to blame.


	12. hold me tight (or don't)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> satzu vampire au. tzuyu is a newly turned vampire. 479w

In retrospect, it's just Tzuyu's luck that it's the most annoying vampire in the world who finds her retching up blood in this alleyway, and not someone like Dahyun's mentor - what was her name again, Jihyo? - who was calm, measured and kind.

 

"No no, you're doing it all wrong," the woman sighs, pulling Tzuyu back by the shoulders. It startles Tzuyu how strong the woman is, her knees scraping against the floors a good five seconds before Tzuyu kicks out uselessly. The woman lets go, though, and Tzuyu glares backwards, hoping the blood smeared around her mouth is deterrent enough. Probably not, given the way the woman's smile widens.

  
"Don't... touch... me," Tzuyu wheezes.

 

She watches Tzuyu bend over the drain for a few more seconds as Tzuyu continues retching, trying her best to spit out all the poisonous-tasting blood that she'd eagerly lapped up merely hours ago. Tzuyu's stomach feels like it's on fire, and it's not a nice thing that she's being watched at her weakest and most vulnerable.

  
"Cute little dhampir," the older vampire sighs wistfully, breaking the uneasy silence "Tell me, when were you turned? Yesterday? Two days ago?"

 

Tzuyu ignores her, focusing more on not choking on the blood in her mouth. She feels a lot better now that she's expelled most of the blood she drank during her feeding frenzy, but the vague feeling of nausea remains, and she groans. She wants to go home, crawl into bed and not leave for a week.

 

"I'm Sana," the vampire supplies. The name doesn't raise any alarms - Tzuyu has the list of predatory vampires memorized, she's not suicidal, and Sana not being on that list either means that she means well or that she's managed to evade notice.

  
"Good... to know."

 

"I live in the penthouse. I'd be happy to take you back, nurse you back to health. You don't look too good." Tzuyu turns, a colourful curse and a _I don't need your charity_ on her lips ready when she gets a proper look at Sana. Her fangs poke out from the corners of her mouth, fully-formed and deadly, and Tzuyu catches sight of the necklace around her neck, glimmering in the dark, as dangerous as Sana is.

  
She can't put her finger on it, but there's something about Sana that warns her to stay away, to run and not look back until she's as far away as conceivably possible. Tzuyu ignores these instincts for the time being, swallowing the saliva clogging her throat and glaring at Sana. She's still in an awful mood, sour and exhausted from the feeding frenzy and the subsequent vomiting fit, and she's in no mood to entertain this vampire.

 

"Why are you doing this?"

 

"No one looked out for me as a dhampir," Sana explains, eyes indifferent. "I want to make sure you make it."


	13. starlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> avatar au, originally posted on my twitter. jihyo is the daughter of a firebender and a waterbender, nayeon is a firebending prodigy, and jeongyeon is jihyo's firebending mentor. 624w

"You're good," Jeongyeon remarks, and Jihyo's face lights up hopefully, "for someone who's never firebended in her life."

 

"I have," Jihyo protests, but they both know that the fledgling attempts at training back home don't count. Jeongyeon means _real_ firebending training, an experienced mentor watching over Jihyo, not Jihyo huddled away, far from everyone else as she stared at the flames dancing in her hands with something close to reckless abandon.

 

Still, Jeongyeon is patient, and urges Jihyo to keep going. Jihyo's plumes of flame are controlled and regular. Too controlled. Sometimes they puff out entirely, pathetically, and frustration surges through her. It doesn't make any sense, how waterbending comes so easily to her but firebending does not, makes her doubt her own identity. She feels like the mutt she was brought up as, and it's an ugly feeling, turning her fire an ugly blood-red.

 

"Stop," Jeongyeon commands, striding over swiftly. "You're putting too much power into your movements. Firebending is light, and sustained - if you keep going like this, you're going to tire yourself."  


That's another thing - the sharp difference between waterbending and firebending. What waterbending requires, firebending rejects, and what waterbending does, firebending cannot. It's an insufferable dichotomy to bestuck in, and Jihyo hates it more with every day that passes.

 

Exasperated, she stares at Jeongyeon, and she gives her a sympathetic but firm look. "You can do it, Jihyo. I believe in you. Take a break."

 

Jihyo retreats to the benches, taking a swig of water as Jeongyeon rolls her wrists and eyes the target in front of her. In one effortless kick, a ball of fire explodes from her and engulfs the training dummy, and Jihyo's afraid she might actually go blind for a moment.

 

-

 

"That's Im Nayeon," Jeongyeon says, voice almost reverent as they pass by the arena. Jihyo can feel the heat emanating from inside, wonders how powerful this Nayeon girl must be. "She's a prodigy. Some say she beat the Fire Lord in an Agni Kai, and that she paid dearly for it."

 

The look in Jeongyeon's eyes clears, because she shakes her head, "But those are silly rumours, and it'd do you good not to listen to them."

 

Jihyo raises an eyebrow. It's been six months since she arrived in the Fire Nation, and she knows she must share _some_ part of herself with these people, but she hasn't been able to find a similarity in herself with these cocky, arrogant people yet. They have an incessant, unquenchable need to protect and defend their honour. She doesn't vocalize this sentiment, though -- she knows how disappointed Jeongyeon would be.

 

-

 

_Power has always been in your blood._

Jihyo trembles. The blood in her veins runs hot, and she knows what she must do, even if every bone in her body begs her not to, to consider an alternate route. Nayeon is looking at her like she's the only thing she wants to see, eyes shining as she nods slowly. The love in her eyes is so intense it makes Jihyo weak.

 

She could handle this on her own without Jihyo, but she wants to let Jihyo prove herself, is willing to step out of the limelight that being the prodigial firebender gives for Jihyo. She is so incomprehensibly selfless that it puzzles Nayeon; because she knows she wouldn't do the same for Nayeon. It only makes it more imperative that she doesn't fail.

 

She closes her eyes and thinks to what the Sages had said.

 

 _You are a firebender_.

 

She thinks to Mina, pinning her to the wall in one swift, terrifying movement and saying something entirely different.

 

_You are a waterbender._

"No," she whispers, flame and water exploding from her fingertips, "I'm both."


	14. make a move

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> samoyeon. 1496w

sana looks up blearily when momo comes in, "oh hey." she nods towards a plastic bag hanging off a curtain hook, "nayeon came in while you were out. she got some of the soup you like so much."

 

momo raises her eyebrows, surprised but not disappointed. nayeon makes up for her frequent absences with material purchases for both of them, ranging from food when momo forgets to get lunch to pretty oversized jackets when sana complains that the temperature in the studio's way too low. "thank her for me if she comes back again."

 

"she said she'll be back in a while." sana's clearly been working for a while, and momo wonders if she got enough sleep, because sana is slurring her words and can't seem to keep her head upright. the younger girl nods slowly, blinking at momo as the pen in her grasp rolls out of her hand.

 

momo wants to say something else, but sana is already writing again, chin slipping out of her hand drowsily. she decides to go find a blanket instead.

 

-

 

momo owns a dance studio. it'd been her dream since she could remember. it used to be an empty warehouse in the middle of nowhere. while it remains in the middle of nowhere (there are malls only ten minutes away from them now, which is a plus in momo's eyes), it's now been refurnished enough to look and feel like momo's second home. her first home being the unit right next to the studio. she'd even skimped on refurnishing her own home at the start, staying in the studio and renting it out till she scraped together the money to get herself a proper bed to sleep on.

 

this was all before sana came over from japan, of course, because they all know that sana would've raised hell and the seven seas if she knew momo was sleeping on the floor of her studio.

 

she'd bought it over from the previous owners fresh out of college. she hadn't known what to do with her degree - hadn't wanted to go into a dull blue-collar job. she'd looked to sana for advice on this, the younger girl settling in with a job as a technical writer at a startup but being equally miserable, and sana told her to buy a dance studio, refurnish it and start teaching and practising dance as a full-time job, like she'd always wanted to.

 

and so momo did.

 

-

 

nayeon doesn't show often during work hours, the main reason being that she has a job that has her halfway across seoul, right in the centre of a packed business district. she laughs when sana and momo call her a rich socialite, but it's true, even though nayeon takes special care to wipe off the makeup and change out of her blouse and blazer when she visits.

 

the times where she does come are a treat, usually a result of her being able to negotiate a half day, or when her lunch breaks are long. she comes in just as momo's draping a blanket over a sleeping sana, grinning toothily at the younger girl.

 

"rough night?" nayeon smirks.

 

momo sticks out her tongue, and nayeon laughs, coming to sit with her against the mirror. momo has her knees pulled to her chest as she idly watches the two loves of her life. nayeon leans her head against her, sighing softly, happily. her hand comes to intertwine itself with momo's, bringing it into her lap. nayeon's hand is soft and warm and all types of comforting, and momo likes the feeling.

 

"did you clean the mirrors?" nayeon muses, rubbing her thumb against momo's pulse point. momo resists the urge to shiver, reminds herself that sana's not awake and it wouldn't be nice, if they did something in front of her without her knowing.

 

but it would be so reckless and daring, and her breath hitches at the thought.

 

"mhm."

 

"i like them." nayeon's voice is always coarse and low these days, whether it's the flu bug that's going around or her picking up on momo and sana going weak for her voice. she leans in close, breath tickling the side of momo's neck.

 

"i have a class in h-half an hour," momo protests weakly, nayeon beginning to kiss down her throat. "unnie."

 

"oh, of course." nayeon moves back, her lips leaving momo's skin with a tantalizing breath, and momo wants to scream and let nayeon have her way with her, 12.30pm class be damned. "better?"

 

but nayeon is smirking playfully, with no malice and momo can't stay frustrated for long. just nods quickly, "better."

 

-

 

"momo," sana calls out sweetly, "can you help me with this?" she's balanced precariously atop a ladder, trying to arrange a twisted ceiling tile back in its place, and momo hums her assent, coming over to help steady the ladder. "thank you," sana murmurs, tiptoeing just a little to get the perfect reach.

 

momo is left awkwardly staring at sana's ass, because where she is gives her a perfect view that's a little too much at eye level, and momo really isn't being creepy. she really isn't. because sana is bending forward on the ladder and pushing her ass right in momo's face, and momo thinks she might have stopped breathing.

 

sana lets out a loud whine of understanding as she turns the ceiling tile back into place, muttering something along the lines of so that's what went wrong. she turns behind to make sure momo's holding the ladder still before she makes her descent, hands dusty and powdery.

 

she notices momo's aggressive poker face, and laughs, cupping momo's jaw and kissing her.

 

"you're so cute," and momo thinks about how sana and nayeon will be the death of her.

 

-

 

they work well as a group.that is, when they can pass off as a group and not as a couple, because their hands are always on each other that it's hard to think otherwise. it's... unconventional, momo knows, but she can't find herself to care or worry, especially when she can't fathom having nayeon without sana, or having sana without nayeon.

 

she does wonder how it'd be like if she only had one of them, or if they were dating each other instead of momo. it's entire plausible, especially because they're so pretty and soft and momo doesn't see how they fell for her in the first place. it'd be different, certainly, and it wouldn't give momo nearly half the satisfaction that she has now.

 

a world without nayeon bringing her lunch and sending her cute messages, or a world without sana staying up with her when she practises, is a world that momo can't, and doesn't want to imagine. it's just one of those things that are non-negotiable.

 

-

 

she's in the middle of a class when the back door opens. sana's eyes widen in the back of the room, and she scurries off to meet and eagerly greet nayeon. some of her students turn back to eye the newcomer, others enticed by the smell of the ramen from that japanese take-out place down the road nayeon's brought with her. (momo loves it, but sana maintains that nothing matches the taste of hole-in-the-wall shops in japan where there's no written menu.) some of them look starstruck.

 

"eyes to the front," momo barks, more out of jealousy that sana can be with nayeon right now than actual irritation at her students' lack of discipline. if she can't be with nayeon now, then no one can, and she fixates the teenager in the front row with a firm look to assert that.

 

sana and nayeon stumble outside together, the door closing with a soft thud behind them, and momo swallows and continues the lesson.

 

she's sulky and crawling out of her skin by the time class ends, but sana and nayeon make up for it by pulling her into the backroom marked 'staff only', and that fixes things.

 

-

 

she's sweating and panting from the exertion of a class, the back of her shirt drenched with sweat. she's alone - sana and nayeon are out doing god knows what. they'd invited momo along, of course, because it was a 'bring your plus one' type of thing and they're all each others' plus-ones, but momo had declined on the basis of needing to finish up this choreography. they'd pouted and complained, but momo's just happy she has a job.

 

she looks around her studio, at the mirrors and the fixtures, the bright lights and the plush chairs at the back of the studio. dinner has been left hanging off the curtain hook as always, and momo thinks she spots one of sana's many handbags hanging off the hook opposite it. they're reminders that she isn't alone in all of this, and momo relishes that feeling, keeping these reminders of nayeon and sana close to her heart.

 

it's great. it's perfect. she wouldn't rather have anything else.

 

and so she doesn't.


	15. wonderland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> mihyun childhood friends au. mina and dahyun reconnect. 621w

mina spends the entire of first period staring at dahyun's back. her hair flows nicely down her back, splashing across her shoulders, and mina wonders if it was always this light, or if dahyun lightened it herself. she'd always expressed how unhappy she was with jet-black hair, so maybe she'd gone to the store and gotten one of those hair-lightening kits. without her parents' permission, of course, because mina's sure that dahyun's parents haven't changed in ten years.

 

the funny thing is that she doesn't realize she's staring till sana elbows her gently. the older girl is always so soft, so giggly and so warm that the hard way she's looking at dahyun makes mina's stomach do somersaults. she opens her mouth to say something, but looks back at the teacher and decides against it. mina doesn't miss it, though - _later_.

 

dahyun is attentive in class and doesn't curiously whip her head to the back like the rest of the class when momo gets caught using her phone under the table to read manga. there are snickers and giggles and looks from their classmates as momo meekly hands her phone over to their teacher, but dahyun doesn't join in, just looks ahead. probably maintains the smile mina's so used to. the same one that's charmed so many people, mina included.

 

dahyun answers all the questions their teacher throws at her in a manner that impresses even the prodigies in the room, and mina smiles fleetingly to herself and thinks that dahyun really hasn't changed.

 

-

 

"hey," mina calls out affably after class, grinning as well as she can in dahyun's direction. the other girl is packing up her books, hugging her textbooks close to her chest. "dahyun, hey, wait up."

 

a bolt of panic runs through mina when dahyun gives her an unreadable look - does she not remember her? how could she not, when they'd exchanged those glances when dahyun came into class? those looks must've meant something, because the look on dahyun's face had been unimitable.

 

dahyun's eyes flick to sana, and then back to mina. she doesn't smile, not even politely. "i'm sorry? i have to go."

 

"dahyun-" mina protests, the ugly feeling in her stomach returning as sana grips her forearm to pull her back from chasing after dahyun. "dahyun, we have so much to catch up on-"

 

"you do?" sana asks, hand steadying mina. which is good, because mina thinks she might be trembling. this isn't how their first meeting in nine years was supposed to go. they were supposed to reconcile with no hard feelings, and dahyun was supposed to understand that mina didn't ditch her, it wasn't like that-

 

dahyun purses her lips. "we don't." there are others staring, trying to listen in on this conversation, but mina's head is spinning, and she can't pay attention to that. even sana's touch on her feels like ice, like something that shouldn't be there.

 

"i have so much to say to you," she says quietly, stepping closer to dahyun. because she does. she wants to remind dahyun how they used to chase the dumb ice cream truck (the one with the off-tune song that they re-composed) around their neighborhood, or that dahyun fell out of a tree trying to get a bird egg for mina after mina said she liked penguins, or that they went to every one of each others' recitals.

 

and dahyun does the unthinkable - she smiles. it's not a kind one, but the corners of her lips lift, and that should be enough.

 

but it isn't.

 

"you picked your dreams over me, mina. i think that says enough."

 

and that's all mina hears before her world crashes down around her ears.

 


	16. champagne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> minayeon bar au. mina owns a bar and nayeon is a singer. 596w

how mina got to own and run this place is a combination of bad late-night decisions, familial pressure to get out and do something with her life, and sana. the last thing meaning that sana had found a strip club up for sale and convinced mina to buy it and revamp it to become a classy lesbian bar, because who wouldn't like that? sana had been doing gigs around seoul for a while, and mentioned offhandedly that a bar to serve as her home turf would be a great thing. curse mina's soft heart.

 

and so seven months after they first found it, mina became the proud owner of the bean flicker (no prizes as to who picked the name), the first lesbian bar in this part of seoul. rowdy nightclubs flank them, and their patrons range from ditzy girls who'd come to avoid the many men hitting on them, or on rarer (and better) occasions, women who love women just as god intended.

 

it's great. they'd picked up more friends on their way, a host of people mina knows the bar would collapse into rubble without.

 

mina tends the bar, sana and jihyo perform and use the downtime to shack it up in their dressing rooms, jeongyeon does security, dahyun serves the drinks and makes sure the stock comes in on time.

 

it had been... unconventional at first, especially since a gaudy strip club used to stand where they are right now (they still regularly turn away leering old men who haven't caught up to the present yet), but they've made it work.

 

-

 

"i have someone i'd like you to meet," jihyo says one slow night. there's a pleasant buzz in the air, their usual customers tucked away in their booths, leaving the staff to sit around at the bar. "she's an old friend of mine."

 

"from jyp?" jeongyeon asks, and jihyo nods. the two of them have been friends since forever - they came as a package deal when mina was doing hiring. apparently, they were trainees for the longest time before deciding to leave and pursue greener pastures. "who is it?"

 

"im nayeon," jihyo looks to mina, "you need performers, don't you?"

 

"you and sana are good already," mina insists gently, but sana is warming up to the idea, her arm around jihyo as she eagerly agrees that yes, they could use a new performer.

 

-

 

mina bangs on the door of sana's dressing room (designated as such by the a3 piece of paper with sana's name in block letters) impatiently, "unnie? hurry up, we need you out there."

 

a muffled shout comes from inside, and mina rolls her eyes, jiggling the knob and turning it. sana has a bad habit of scrolling on instagram and losing track of time as she does so, which has resulted in her being late to performances more than once. mina isn't even sure what she's doing on instagram, other than watching slime and clickbait videos.

 

"sana, i swear," mina sighs, pushing the door open.

 

"mina?" sana's voice comes from behind her, and a very naked nayeon screams and runs out of sight, crashing into an empty clothes rack. the clothes rack, unfortunately, is empty, and doesn't help cover nayeon up.

 

mina is frozen, gaping at nayeon, and all she can think about is that this wasn't the first impression she wanted to give, and _oh god_ nayeon is going to shittalk her to jihyo and jihyo is going to kill mina for fucking this up, "oh my god," she croaks, and slams the door shut.


	17. satisfied

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> namo superhero au. 529w

im nayeon is a lot of things. she's pretty, smart, a good student. there isn't an assignment from the past two years that hasn't been handed back with high grades despite low effort. she's pretty sure she's the only one in her chemistry course who hasn't emailed the professor twelve minutes before midnight begging for an extension. she hasn't been single for two, going on three years, held down tight by her dependable girlfriend.

im nayeon is a lot of things.

a superhero is definitely not one of them.

/

"you can't tell momo," dahyun says quickly, hands coming up to shush nayeon as the glittery foil of a suit lands in a pile in front of her. "please don't scream."

"this is a mistake." nayeon takes a step back. she fixes dahyun with a steely look, but dahyun doesn't even have the grace to look guilty, just looks at the space above nayeon's head as if there's a neon sign flashing over it. there might as well be one. come one, come all! look at the freakshow that is im nayeon!

logically, she's overreacting. illogically? she hates this.

dahyun scratches the back of her neck, avoiding nayeon's eyes. "if you're not fond of the aesthetic of this suit, we can get you one like mine." she taps the garish plastic watch on her left wrist twice, and there's a loud flash before dahyun blinks into existence, now in a purple foil disaster.

good fucking lord. she looks like a bunch of grapes, and nayeon isn't afraid to voice this out. she's not really feeling very sensitive today.

"you look like a bunch of grapes."

dahyun pouts. "it looks good! it highlights the texture of my pores."

"what does that even fucking-" nayeon sighs, shaking her head. "you know what? forget it. just. what do i have to do now that i'm an official ordained superhero?" it even says so on the small rectangle of plastic lying on nayeon's foil uniform. official ordained superhero, although the font looks less like it was printed and more like dahyun took a sharpie and squiggled the words with the most syllables she could think of at the time. "do i go out and help old ladies cross the street? pull kittens from trees?"

"neither," dahyun replies, looking significantly more bubbly now that nayeon seems to be taking her seriously, given that nayeon never takes anyone seriously. "those are reserved for the boy scouts. you have superpowers, and it'd be useful if you didn't use them for the same things little kids do to earn patches. uh," the younger girl pauses, "i'm actually not sure about what you have to do, so you can run along first. we'll call you when you need to."

nayeon makes a sound of disgust as she picks the pile of clothes up and turns to leave.

"don't tell momo!" dahyun reminds.

/

hell, why shouldn't she tell momo?

what's there to hide from her girlfriend anyway? hey momo, i’m a superhero. i have superpowers, and i might just use them on you! haha. joke. that’s what i was doing. 

she groans. this is going to be hard. 


	18. power

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> indulgent supervillain!nayeon au. 528w

"we're more similar than you think, you and me," nayeon says, only slightly tripping over an exposed wire as she turns to face the window. the sights are marvelous. skyscrapers, ships, and the inevitability of the newest hero's death.

 

deep breaths, she reminds herself. the heroes always get more scared when she speaks slowly. mina says it's something to do with intonation.

 

"i was once like you, too. ran to the lair of the biggest, most evil villain the moment i got my license. you think you're the first one to have tried?"

 

all too-telling silence. she pretends not to notice the hero slipping out of the chains nayeon had her locked in, or her victorious smile. she sighs and ruminates on the fact that as long as these heroes remain tethered to the bureau, they're not going to flourish as they should. she feels almost sorry for this hero.

 

ice freezes her feet, and she puts her hands up slowly, still facing the bay window.

 

"oops. you got me."

 

the hero pants, wild with adrenaline and smugness, cape swirling. nayeon gives her a 0 for poise. twin blocks of ice weigh her hands down in the next second, clinging to her fingers and theoretically disabling her powers.

 

"smart," nayeon observes approvingly, "that's the first thing they teach you in the bureau, yeah? the hands are the source of all heroes' powers."

 

"give it up, nayeon," she says, way prouder of herself than she should be, and nayeon sighs.

 

the ice melts, and she turns around, clenching her fist. the hero is lifted five feet off the ground, eyes bugging out of her head, legs kicking out in pure shock. her hands come up to try to peel away the invisible vice grip around her neck. it happens so fast, like lightning striking a particularly unsuspecting tree, that it could almost be counted as breaking the rules.

 

"well i'm not a hero, _dumbass_ ," nayeon growls, "and if, for some reason, you thought you would be any different from all the other rookies the bureau throws at me, then you ought to leave before your friends end up having to pick your internal organs off the pavement."

 

nayeon takes a deep breath, and for a moment the rookie looks genuinely terrified that she's about to be lobbed through the floor to ceiling windows nayeon was just admiring the skyline out of. but that's ridiculous - nayeon has enough maintenance costs to keep up with. she's stepped on enough shattered glass to swear off dramatic exits for life.

 

the windows slide open, and nayeon lobs the hero through them. for both their sakes, she hopes this rookie decides to leave the bureau. 


	19. firestarter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sahyo avatar au. 1231w

with both the king and queen being away in the earth kingdom for business, it falls onto the crown princess and de-facto head of her house in her parents' absence to welcome jihyo. minatozaki sana calls for the doors to be closed the moment jihyo makes it halfway across the throne room, leaving the two of them alone together. 

jihyo bows, "your highness." 

"welcome!" the princess gushes, leaning forward on the arms of her throne. she doesn't look small in it at all, which is surprising. the royal throne is carved from gold and other precious metals, and has a hulking frame jihyo is sure would dwarf her. sana just looks one with the throne, every bit as regal and royal as the throne she rests on. "park jihyo, am i right?" 

jihyo raises her eyebrows. the words that come out of her mouth seem to challenge any assumptions people might make about her. she sounds like she has her head in the clouds, like she's not really paying attention, and remembers the guards gossiping about her as she had been escorted into the throne room. 

sana is one of two non-bender children of the ruling house. unfortunate, really, considering that every ruling family is expected to bear powerful firebenders.

"that's right, your highness." 

"you're so cute!" sana squeals, hands bunching up. she seems to remember what jihyo's here for a split second later, and she adopts a more serious tone (jihyo isn't buying it), "how have your travels been treating you? you come from the outskirts, am i right?" 

"yes, your highness. the royal escorts have been very accommodating. thank you." 

"loosen up," sana commands, shaking her head in amusement. "you prodigy types are always so nervous. well, come on!" 

jihyo laughs edgily, rising from her bow, scratching the back of her neck. "i'm not sure what you mean, your highness-" 

"do something!" sana gushes. "i'm sure you have tricks up your sleeve." 

jihyo shrugs. nonbenders, after all, are known to be easily amused. her originally high opinion of the royal family is plummeting with this childish representative, and though she would never bite the hand that feeds her... 

she summons a small spark, the spark rolling around in the palm of her hand, warming it before twin balls of fire sprout in her palms. 

she raises her palms, expecting sana to be amused, but the princess frowns, "is that all?" 

jihyo shakes her head quickly, "of course not, your highness." so sana wasn't impressed by a beginner-level trick - sure. jihyo can accept that. 

the balls of fire explode into jets of flame with a bit of gentle persuasion, and jihyo rises a few inches off the ground, looking back to sana expectantly. she increases the intensity of the flames, almost eye-level with sana now, but the princess yawns, fluttering her lashes in a way that communicates that this is the most boring thing she's ever had to bear witness to. 

"come on," sana whines, and jihyo ramps it up, a ring of fire forming around her and expanding gradually. she's beginning to get frustrated - these aren't impossible acts, but they should impress a nonbender, with them being hard even for experienced firebenders. yet sana seems unimpressed, as if she thinks jihyo isn't good enough to warrant being ferried to the capital for intense training. 

she pulls out all the stops in the next five minutes, performs brilliant tricks that would guarantee her entry into any firebending school. by the time she lands on the ground in front of the princess, she's exhausted. 

sana throws one leg over the other. 

"mediocre at best, jihyo." 

anger rises in jihyo's throat, "what would your highness rather i perform?" 

the answer comes in the form of fire exploding around jihyo, enveloping her, swirling around her. she gasps as the fire builds to a height so great she can't see, backpedaling but not knowing where to go. is this an assassination attempt on the princess? what's going on? 

the vortex of fire extinguishes around jihyo, leaving her pespiring furiously and very, very stunned, and sana reclines back on her throne. it registers slowly. this is a once-in-a-lifetime sort of thing. it's over as quickly as it started, the heat vanishing like it's scurrying to be hidden. 

jihyo lets herself exhale. 

sana watches her, unaffected, hands propping her chin up. the royal fire princess is still smiling, that same hypnotic look that leads jihyo to wonder if it'd really happened, or if she'd just wanted it to. she's so cocky, so sure of herself, she couldn't possibly have-- and if she did, why? 

but there's something more than that. arrogance will only take you so far. sana is unsure, vulnerable, and jihyo hates the way she pounces on it. 

"y-you're a bender," she stammers, accusing.

sana tilts her head. 

"you're not the nonbender everyone thinks you are," jihyo says, just to affirm her discovery. only now does the gravity of the situation sink in. sana is a firebender, despite what her house has said time and time again. 

do the king and queen know? jihyo can't think of a reason why they'd agree to cover up sana's firebending - a nonbender heir only weakens them, and encourages slanderous gossip about the abilities of their house. it's clear that sana is nothing like her weakling of a brother - he's well liked, but the whole land knows that the fire prince couldn't summon a spark if he tried - so why cover her up? 

then it only means one thing -- sana's the one who's been hiding her abilities. 

sana shrugs, a smirk toying on her lips. "you got me." 

jihyo shakes her head, feeling something very uncomfortable build in her abdomen. she starts pacing, "i don't understand. why do you hide it? everyone thinks you're weak. you could be strong if you showed them what you were really capable of." 

she could be on her knees for how desperate she sounds, fists clenched by her sides. heat spreads through her body, starting from her feet and engulfing her, but she rages back against it. she's come so far, she can't turn back now and erase all the progress she's made. not now. 

"what's the point?" the princess retorts, making jihyo feel very, very small. "fire is destructive. i've never seen the point." 

"you could be great-" 

"i could be a weapon," sana hisses, face contorted into a harsh glare. "i know it wouldn't have occurred to you, but if they knew i could bend, i'd spend my days forced to train and intimidate rival houses." 

she shakes her head, "why do you think you're here, jihyo?" she doesn't have to say anything else - they both know. jihyo wasn't brought her to nurture her talents - she was brought here to be weaponized, in the place of a crown princess who can't. 

jihyo wants to say something, anything, but words fail her, and sana shakes her head. "that's not how i want to live. and i want you to respect that."

"o-okay." 

the doors to the throne room swing open, a pair of guards coming in to inform jihyo that her time with the princess is up, and sana is back to looking bubbly and ditzy, any trace of the harsh, intelligent firebender dead and buried. 

she grins, "i hope you have a great stay here, jihyo. i'll see you again."


	20. l'appel du vide

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> nahyo au, though nayeon is never named. could also be sahyo. 621w.

the cloudy nights are the worst of all. 

 

jihyo’s legs hang off the edge of the building, the city looming beneath. this is an act of defiance, she tells herself. _if a tree falls in the middle of a forest, but no one’s around, does it make a sound?_ _—_ if there’s no one to bear witness to this revolutionary gesture, she supposes it doesn’t really matter. especially not when she’s supposed to be a shining example to the rest of the department. 

 

head up. shoulders straight. hey, you’re a leader. do this. strike that out. pretend that the city police department is barely functioning on a long-insufficient budget. 

 

proceed. 

 

her phone chimes, and she sighs, mentally preparing herself to get up and walk back to her desk. she can only be happy that today’s a friday, marking the end to a horrifically stressful week of overtime and wandering into her apartment building at dawn. (no matter that she’ll probably have to come in tomorrow - crime doesn’t follow a 9 to 5 schedule.) 

 

“the stars are beautiful tonight, aren’t they?” a voice muses from behind her, and jihyo whirls around, hand grazing her holstered gun.

 

it’s a principle of jihyo’s that everyone looks bad in latex, without exception. every vigilante, every single hero who’s stepped up to combat the villains that haunt this city (and subsequently perished) has chosen some combination of latex and leather for their suits. these suits are always ugly and taut, oddly coloured and unflattering. 

 

and they are always  _ so  _ hard to peel off once blood’s adhered them to the hero’s body. 

 

this person is no different, and jihyo’s worries about a villain or a crony having snuck up on her are abated. her training prevails, though, and she wavers, stuck between going back to her desk as she’d planned and tackling the woman to the floor. 

 

large eyes crinkle up at her, and jihyo looks at the masked woman properly. her features are obscured by a half-face mask that leave her mouth and eyes uncovered, but jihyo knows she’s pretty. she just doesn’t care right now. 

 

“give it a break, officer,” the woman lilts. “just stargaze with me.” 

 

“who are you?” 

 

“doesn’t matter.” the woman comes closer, hands palm-up as she walks past jihyo and sits down on the ledge. 

 

swinging her legs innocently, she waits for to jihyo to walk back to the ledge. jihyo’s mind is going a million miles per minute, mostly wondering why she’s obeying the orders of a stranger. she takes pride in leading and giving clear commands, not taking them. though a hallmark of a good leader is learning how to take orders. that’s just not who she is. 

 

“i shouldn’t be here,” jihyo says carefully, fingers still tiptoeing towards her holster. 

 

“half your department is in itaewon getting wasted,” comes the harsh but accurate reply. “you can spare these few minutes, officer.” 

 

“why me?” jihyo murmurs. she wonders if the woman knows of her weekly jaunts to the rooftop, if she’s been watching her. does she know who she is? she must - jihyo’s promotion had been a very publicized affair, and had ended with a dozen people dying. 

 

she swallows. 

 

“doesn’t matter,” the woman replies gently. she pats jihyo’s thigh. “promise me you’ll keep coming up here to sit?” 

 

jihyo raises her eyebrows. “what?” 

 

“as opposed to throwing yourself off the building.” 

 

there’s an uneasy pause, in which jihyo realizes that this woman knows a lot more about her than most of the people she’s been working with for the past three years do. 

 

“i don’t like making promises,” she says instead, and stays till the woman bids her a soft goodbye, and a certainty that she’ll be back. 


	21. swim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> posting the entire nahyo thing i have... it's really long but nowhere done and unedited so there's a lot of repetitive sentences and bad writing all around. i'm really frustrated with this so i just want to post it and go work on something else rip... a lot of scenes have been left out so that's why the continuity's a bit off 3073w

_ the water’s getting colder, let me in your ocean - swim _

 

a/n: nayeon is younger than jihyo for no reason at all 

 

there are frightened knocks against the hull of her boat, sudden and jolting her from the depths of a restless sleep. clanging, metal against metal, but layered with something else. something different, nothing like anything jihyo has ever heard before, not in her months aboard this ship. 

 

it’s nothing natural, receding and swelling with the lapping of the waves but still uneven. 

 

it’s dark out. she can’t see anything, even with her eyes quickly acclimating to the darkness of her cabin. she ascertains that it’s the middle of the night with help of the clock on the wall, the stars still bright and domineering. jihyo slaps her hand along the wall before she finds her flashlight, pushing the swing door open to make her way onto deck.

 

the knocking is getting less frequent now, and for a moment jihyo thinks she might be able to put it down to her imagination. but it’s still there, coming back just as she’s ready to head back in. it bothers her, and she leans over the side of her boat, shining the flashlight down. the beam of the light is weak against the inky blackness of the waves. 

 

for a few moments - nothing. 

 

then there’s another knock, the sound jihyo realizes much later is a human head rocking against the hull of her boat, and then there’s a face emerging from the murky depths, eyes closed. soundless, mouth trying to hit the surface, too busy trying to survive to make a sound. textbook drowning case. 

 

jihyo’s grip on the flashlight falters, but she fights the nausea, turning around and grabbing the life ring. it’s heavy, jihyo’s arms hurt when she hefts it into her arms, but she’s too charged to care. peeking over the side again, she tosses the thing into the sea. as an afterthought, she throws the ladder over the side and jumps in. 

 

ice cold. it’s so, so cold, and jihyo’s limbs freeze up when she comes into contact with the water, the initial shock taking a shameful amount of time to get over before she entangles her arm with the life ring. she kicks out, shivering and forcing herself to keep her mouth closed as she makes her way to the drowning person. man, woman, she can’t tell, not with the moon as her only light source. the waves are relentless, minimizing her best efforts to swim fast, and she grits her teeth.

 

hands punch out and make contact with her shoulders, and jihyo struggles with the life ring, the hard plastic weighing her down and rendering her strength futile. for a moment, she’s terrified that the drowner is going to bring her down with them in their panicked efforts to stay alive, and pulls them close. arms wrap around her back, and jihyo struggles to get the person on the life ring. 

 

water floods up her nose, acidic and burning and it  _ hurts. _ jihyo coughs, writhing away from the steely grip of the other person. she knows better than to open her mouth to tell them that they’re safe, that they can’t grab her or they’ll both drown, so she settles for rubbing hard circles into their back. she’s still in the water up to her neck, and she channels the last of her energy into swimming to the ladder, with the cord to the life ring wrapped around her palm.

 

she grabs onto the ladder’s first rung like it’s her lifeline (because it is), and starts climbing. her ears unclog themselves, salty water draining, giving way to another unpleasant sound - loud sobs and coughs from the person on the life rung. jihyo presses her lips together in a straight line, focusing her strength into pulling herself up. the cord to the life ring is forgotten for the time being.

 

she throws herself over the side, landing on her back and panting. she stares up at the night sky, the half-moon twinkling at her in all its might, as if reminding her of the waves it commands. she pulls herself back up, looking over the side. the other person is drawn into herself, gripping onto the life ring and sobbing.

 

“grab the ladder!” jihyo shouts, wind rushing through her hair. “reach out. just reach out.” 

 

there’s no indication that they heard her, and she shakes her head, dipping her body halfway down the side. the hull of her ship is cold against her arm, but she doesn’t dare complain. she extends her hand, trembling, raising her voice, “please, just grab me. i’ll pull you up.”

 

the waves rumble their dissent. hungry. waiting. furious at being cheated out of a victim.

 

“please!” 

 

shaky fingers reach out for jihyo, brush against her own. they’re slippery and weak and not nearly enough, but jihyo can work with this. she doesn’t know who this person is, but she knows that they’re making this effort right  _ now _ . that’s all that matters. she has to put aside other thoughts and inhibitions and push forward. 

 

_ thank you _ , she whispers soundlessly, firming her grip and pulling them up. the person is light, and jihyo pulls them onto deck with much fuss. she rolls as the person lands on the deck with a thump, gasping and shivering, and takes a moment for herself to survey the situation.

 

“a-are you okay?” she asks, more out of residual panic than actual concern, more for her own sake than theirs. she squints by the light of the moon. it’s a girl. and even in the dim light, jihyo knows that she’s young. she looks about jihyo’s age, even younger by the way she’s shivering and crying, and jihyo’s heart pangs with an age-old feeling. she’s fragile, and god, jihyo is so pained.

 

she wants to ask her what happened, what she was doing in the middle of the night in the sea, but a part of her already knows.

 

jihyo goes to get a towel.

 

-

 

she doesn’t realize how hard she’s shaking till the chocolate powder’s knocked out of the spoon. she stares down at her hands, calloused and rough, willing them to stop trembling. she has no reason to be afraid. she’s back on the boat, she’s safe, and the girl in her bed is supposed to be the frightened one here. this is her turf. 

 

and yet… jihyo doesn’t want to think about it, but the experience has left her more than shaken. she came too close to the brink to be comfortable, out of her league in an arena she thought she’d long conquered.

 

the hot water bubbles, popping at the surface, and jihyo snaps out of her momentary reverie, spooning powder into the mug and mixing. the smell is sweet, comforting, and she cradles the mug in her hands, exhaling at the warmth. she can only hope to bring the same measure of comfort to the girl.

 

“here you go.” 

 

jihyo straightens awkwardly, surveying the girl in front of her. she has a towel wrapped around her, eyes glassy and wet, and still hasn’t said a word. 

 

jihyo’s suddenly very aware of her own set of wet clothes. she’d dashed straight for the hot chocolate right after helping the girl bundle up and lending her a set of clothes, but the cold is settling in, and jihyo knows she should get herself changed before she catches a cold. still… she’s reluctant to leave the girl alone when she’s this vulnerable-looking.

 

the girl looks up, eyes wide as she sips the hot chocolate. it must burn her lips, but she doesn’t start, only blowing before sipping again. a small ring of chocolate forms around her mouth, and she licks it off hungrily. jihyo smiles. 

 

“thank you.” 

 

jihyo affords her a smile. “no problem.”

 

the girl smiles back at her, uncertain, as if she doesn’t believe that this is real. god, what exactly has she been put through? she speaks, and her voice is quiet, ashamed, “what do i have to do for you?”

 

fuck. 

 

“rest.”

 

“but i-”

 

“don’t worry about it,” jihyo soothes, nodding encouragingly. she feels tired, overwhelmingly so. “rest now. we can talk in the morning, okay?”

 

“i’m sorry,” the girl whispers, looking small and haunted, shrinking into herself. her nails dig into her lap. jihyo wonders if it would be appropriate to pull them away. “i don’t even know your name and i…” she trails off.

 

“it’s jihyo. park jihyo. you don’t owe me anything.”

 

“nayeon,” the girl offers meekly, eyes shying away from jihyo’s, “i’m nayeon.”

 

jihyo relaxes. she didn’t even know she was tense. 

 

“sleep, okay? i’ll be here the whole night.”

 

nayeon nods, though she’s still hesitant and looks as if she wants to say something but can’t. she looks like a cornered animal, jihyo thinks. they are similar in that respect. 

 

(she doesn’t want to admit it to herself, but looking at nayeon dredges up insecurities, memories she would rather keep hidden. thoughts she thought she left behind when she sailed all those months ago. she’s unsure how to go on from here. it’s new, and jihyo has never liked new.) 

 

“can you,” nayeon hiccups, blinking, “can you stay here with me?”

 

there’s an unspoken  _ please  _ tacked on behind it, whether out of not wanting to sound too desperate or just because nayeon isn’t that type of person going unsaid, but jihyo understands. 

 

she settles on the edge of the bed, the mattress sinking with her weight. nayeon visibly relaxes at jihyo’s movements. her hair is still sticking to her forehead as she scoots backwards on the mattress, but she doesn’t make a move to pull it away from her eyes. it must not matter to her, not right now. 

 

nayeon’s limbs unfold clumsily, and she leans against the headboard, eyes fluttering shut. 

 

jihyo watches her fall asleep like this, nayeon’s breaths evening out with a soft slackening of her limbs, and reminds herself that this is real. 

 

-

 

she wakes up with a stiff neck and tired eyes, and it takes all of five minutes staring at the ceiling before jihyo remembers that she isn’t alone. 

 

“morning,” she greets gruffly, running a hand through her hair and silently bemoaning the ache that’s already begun to creep up the back of her neck. that’s going to be bothering her for the rest of the day, she’s sure, and the prospect of lying back and down and sleeping the rest of the day away is all too attractive. 

 

but nayeon is staring at her, legs folded, hands in her lap and eyes earnest, head cocked to the side, and jihyo can’t bring herself to do that, she really can’t. 

 

“good morning,” nayeon murmurs. sleepy, soft, sinking. jihyo can tell that isn’t her normal tone. nayeon’s voice sounds like she’s used to addressing rooms of people at a time, whether it may be speaking down to them or simply as an equal. jihyo is curious, but now is’t the time. later, maybe — there’s nothing set in stone for the future. as far as she’s concerned, they have the rest of time. 

 

she doesn’t know what to say, if not some manner of brazen question, so she defaults to the least invasive thing, “slept well?”

 

nayeon’s hair falls over her face when she shakes her head. she pauses, sweeps it out of her face, and ducks away from jihyo’s smile shyly. 

 

“not really.” she does not elaborate, and jihyo does not probe. 

 

she nods instead, tongue dry and heavy in her mouth, “okay.” 

 

nayeon watches jihyo get off the bed, cross the remaining length of the small cabin and push her hand against the door. sunlight drips into the room lazily, shedding light on the mug from last night. it’ll be warm today. 

 

she looks back at nayeon, expression softening but tone remaining matter-of-fact, “i’m going to get breakfast ready and tidy the ship up a bit. you’re free to come along if you want, or you can stay here and sleep. i don’t have a preference.”

 

nayeon doesn’t need another directive for her to scramble off the bed and follow jihyo. 

 

-

 

nayeon falls into step behind jihyo like a shadow. she ducks out of sight when jihyo turns her head too fast, frightened and startled, and only creeps out at jihyo’s gentle persuasion. it’s not her fault, though, and it seems to give her comfort, so jihyo stops pointing it out, letting nayeon trail after her like a lost puppy as she goes about preparing for the day’s voyage.

 

and really, nayeon tries. she tries to make herself useful, watching jihyo diligently before making a valiant attempt to emulate her actions, but jihyo quickly puts a stop to it.

 

“don’t do that.” 

 

nayeon’s head shoots up, and the wrench clatters out of her hand. her lips are parted, as if ready to utter an apology to jihyo, but jihyo holds up a hand. 

 

“it’s fine. i can do it on my own.” she leaves out the part where nayeon’s disrupting her peace. everything on this ship, even its repairs, was designed to only require one person’s efforts. just like how jihyo intended, just like how she likes it. she was never going to make this voyage with another person, and nayeon has thrown a wrench - pardon the pun - in her plans in more ways than one. 

 

nayeon bites her lip, “i’m sorry.” 

 

she waves it off. “just rest, okay? you don’t have to do anything.” 

 

a beat. she breathes, and nayeon breathes out. 

 

“please don’t argue with me on this.” 

 

nayeon nods, and sits. 

 

-

 

nayeon is twenty-two, three years younger than jihyo. she is (was) a student at a good university. a law major, because her passion had been the justice system and arbitration. good student. great personality excellent grades. she’d lost steam halfway through the programme and stopped going to class. things had escalated, and then— 

 

nayeon had planned to die that night. 

 

this is all information that nayeon lets slip out during the course of the day with jihyo. jihyo sticks to her resolution and doesn’t probe, only interrupting to clarify what she hears and to tell nayeon to slow down because she’s speaking too fast. nayeon is jumpy, nervous and touches her neck when she’s uncomfortable. (she’s uncomfortable the whole time.) 

 

she has various physical tics that give away what she’s thinking, and jihyo gets used to them quickly. nayeon rubs her hands together often, even when the sun’s scorching down on the ship and they’re both dripping with sweat. she chews on her bottom lip when she doesn’t know what to say. she flinches when jihyo raises her hand. 

 

and she can never make eye contact.

 

the curiosity is killing her, but jihyo chastises herself for that. nayeon isn’t anywhere near confident with her yet, and jihyo knows that she has to approach this carefully. in all respects, nayeon is still a stranger to her, and it doesn’t feel right to push like this. if nayeon will tell her more one day, then she will. and if she won’t… that’s not jihyo’s decision to make. 

 

“i was so scared,” nayeon tells her in a hoarse whisper, fingers digging into jihyo’s shirt as jihyo peers through a pair of binoculars. for how much she hates being touched, she likes touching, and jihyo doesn’t have a big enough opinion on the matter to object to nayeon clinging onto her. “i knew i was going to die.” 

 

this is the second time nayeon’s told her this. she must get paranoid that jihyo can’t hear her and repeats some things for her benefit, some for jihyo’s, mostly to reassure herself that she’s real. jihyo nods in response, humming as she turns the binoculars. 

 

the grip on her shirt tightens a little, and nayeon lets a soft sigh into jihyo’s ear.

 

-

 

jihyo sinks into her corner of the bed. nayeon likes her space, and jihyo had picked up on her claustrophobia soon enough, so she makes an effort not to box nayeon in. she sleeps in the corner, slipping onto the floor most nights because she can’t stay still. nayeon is always thankful. 

 

not tonight. 

 

“unnie,” nayeon says. 

 

jihyo is dozing off, weary from the events of the day, but she perks up anyway at the sound of nayeon’s voice. nayeon didn’t sleep much at first, but as the days wore on her, she got more comfortable here, felt safer. there’s something about the waves that comfort her. 

 

“yes?” 

 

nayeon fidgets with her hands, digging her nails into her palms. “can you come sleep with me?” 

 

jihyo takes a moment to process it, but nayeon’s brows knit together worriedly, and she shakes her head, “it’s okay. i know that you might not want to. it’s fine. i don’t want to impose, i-” 

 

“nayeon?”

 

“yes, unnie?”

 

(jihyo never asked nayeon to speak to her formally, but the younger girl does. jihyo’s started putting it down to something else that gives nayeon comfort.) 

 

she doesn’t reply, stretching as she moves up the bed. nayeon doesn’t shrink away, eyes eager and lips parted as jihyo gets closer to her. there’s a small, shy smile playing on her lips, just like the rest of her. 

 

-

 

she’s going under. there’s water rushing into her nose and lungs and she can’t breathe. she surges up, aiming for the surface, but another wave buffets her and she lets go. her fingers burn with the memory of metal against them, and she wants to laugh. so this is how she goes. all of this - trying to be a better person, learning how to coexist with her demons - has been for nothing.

 

it’d be funnier if not for the fact that  _ nayeon _ ’s still on the ship. she’s asleep, tucked away in her section of the bed but probably splayed out into jihyo’s side, and she will wake up to jihyo gone. forever. 

 

it occurs to jihyo that nayeon’s first thought will be that jihyo left her. her lungs ache for air, and she sinks beneath the waves with a soft sigh. 

 

_ i’m sorry. i’m sorry. i’m sorry.  _

 

_ i love you.  _

 

water laps over her head, the ocean savouring a well-deserved meal, and jihyo lets go- 

 

“no!” 

 

bubbles. she can’t see. and then she can, head bursting through the water. there are hands pulling her close, up again, and jihyo feels herself go limp. 

  
  



	22. wt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sahyo au. 359w

Jihyo bounces from one foot to another, still finding energy to even with how her shoulders hurt from the day’s proceedings. (She tells herself she mustn’t show any weakness, not here.) She feels small, embarrassed under Sana’s gaze, as if she’s been caught doing something she wasn’t supposed to be doing. 

 

Sana smiles at her. It’s coy, arch, flames licking at the corners of her lips before she pulls her gaze from Jihyo. She reaches for something behind the counter. 

 

“Onyx tincture,” the potions seller says shortly, fingers curling around the ornate glass bottle. From how calloused her fingers are, Jihyo suspects that she might’ve blown that bottle herself. “It’ll protect you from the wolves, but not much else. A swig of this will mask your scent from the lycans for a night.”

 

Jihyo bites her lip. There’s more to this shopkeeper than she’s letting in on. There’s something she doesn’t want Jihyo to know, whether it may be in her smile or those straight teeth Jihyo can’t stop thinking about. 

 

She doesn’t like the feeling of being shut out, of someone else holding all the cards. Jeongyeon always said it would get her into trouble one day. Maybe this is the day she throws away her inhibitions and goes in for the kill, abandons all her facades and pretenses and lives up to the legacy she will leave. 

 

_ (Not today _ , her blood whispers as it rushes past in her ears.  _ Wait for it. _

 

Begrudgingly, she obeys.) 

 

“I’m not looking for that,” she replies. Clenches her fists by her sides when Sana fixes her with another one of those looks, willing herself to be strong. “I need something for the blood-drinkers.”

 

A laugh. Sana shakes her head fondly, eyes crinkling in amusement, fondness, some murky mix of the two. She admonishes Jihyo with a shake of her index finger,  “You have nothing to fear, Jihyo.” 

 

Jihyo’s eyes widen, “How do you know my-” 

 

“The night is young,” Sana interrupts, eyes dark. “You should go home, weary traveler.” 

 

“But-” 

 

“Goodnight.”

 

Jihyo wakes up on the ground outside the shop, a  _ Closed _ sign swinging in her face, her head throbbing soundly. 


	23. the resistance lives

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> maybe one day i will start and finish an avatar au? maybe. 1644w, sanayeon / sajeong

her messenger hawk is the first one to notice that something’s wrong. 

 

jeongyeon is petting him languidly, nails combing the stiff, water-soaked feathers on his back when he bristles, only very slightly at first, before it’s a full-body tremble. he makes a frightened sound, looking up at her, and jeongyeon thinks that if he were less well-trained, he’d take a dump where she’s perched on her arm. 

 

his talons dig hard into her flesh, though, and she grimaces, shaking him off gently, wondering what’s gotten into him. she’s trained him to be relaxed even in the tightest of situations, and he, in turn, has been nothing short of a loyal companion to her. the afternoon has been nothing but tranquil, the clouds white and the sky blue. jeongyeon is unused to this sort of behaviour from him. she thinks of a suitably admonishing message for him, raps her knuckles against him. not noticing who’s at the door. 

 

“miss yoo. the princess seeks an audience with you.”

 

“of course,” she replies a stunned moment later, shushing her hawk when he squawks ignobly. 

 

she will regret not running when she had the chance. 

 

-

 

nayeon is playing with a necklace as jeongyeon makes her way into the throne room. green fire burns something unnatural in the glass pendant, and jeongyeon can’t help but be as enthralled as nayeon is. she’s almost certain it’s another one of nayeon’s exclusive trinkets she commissions from the blacksmith and the glassblower working in the forges. nayeon does love her jewelry. 

 

to add insult to the wound, almost all the jewelry she commissions have parts pillaged from the cities the fire lord has his generals attack. week after week, they return to the throne room with reports of successful invasions and conquests. week after week, the fire lord - nayeon’s father,  _ their  _ father - gives them his blessing to advance. 

 

(the unsuccessful generals are not welcome home.)

 

nayeon has the servants rummage through the spoils of war, bring back the most interesting ones for the smiths to incorporate into accessories. last week, it was a bracelet with the tooth of a fox-antelope killed as troops pushed towards ba sing se. the week before that, nayeon was wearing a fur coat made from the koalaotter, native to the northern water tribe. this vanity isn’t to be confused with airheadedness, though. nayeon is as crafty as they come. she has the tailors, glassblowers and blacksmiths make only one of each item, so that she can rub it into jeongyeon’s face exactly how much better she is. 

 

_ i was born lucky _ , she’d mentioned once, twirling a gold-plated staff in jeongyeon’s face with enough poise and power not to hit her square in the face, but to come pretty damn close.  _ you were lucky to be born.  _

 

jeongyeon takes a deep breath. being around nayeon is aggravating. reminds her of everything that she can’t have. the throne, royal lineage, the acknowledgement of who her father is. because the fire lord, for how strong he purports himself to be, is too weak to admit his mistakes. especially when those mistakes come in a form of a child by a woman who wasn’t his wife. especially when she is supposed to be content with being kept in the palace at arm’s length, somewhere between a servant and a royal. 

 

“nayeon,” she greets steadily. 

 

nayeon grins back at her. immature. jeongyeon stares back stonily. “what, i don’t get a curtsy? most people who come into the throne room quiver before my presence.” 

 

she’s right, in a sense. the throne room is downright terrifying, long flames fencing nayeon in the throne, portraits of the previous fire lords lining the walls. in the fire lord’s throne, nayeon looks tiny, juvenile, and jeongyeon prays that she knows that. 

  
“where is the fire lord?”

 

nayeon shrugs. fiddles with the pendant in her hands, looking down and pretending to be preoccupied, distracted. jeongyeon knows she is anything but. she’s keeping a gate open for jeongyeon to fall into. “does it matter? your audience is with me.” 

 

“it has been an awfully long time since he took ill,” jeongyeon notes dryly. 

 

nayeon bristles.

 

“so it has.”

 

“there are rumours,” jeongyeon chooses her words carefully. nayeon can pick and choose her words for maximum impact, but she forgets that jeongyeon can, too. they are more alike than they like to admit. “of a certain general zhao who seeks to depose the fire lord, whether it be by assassination or military coup. what was it that the fire lord came down with?” 

 

“we’re not sure yet,” comes the curt reply. “but my father has been ill. so what? rumours are just rumours, jeongyeon, and i’ll have you pay dearly if you dare suggest otherwise.” 

 

jeongyeon rolls her eyes. nayeon’s temper tantrums are a constant occurrence, but jeongyeon knows best that she is all bark and no bite. “oh?” 

 

“yes.” nayeon regards her icily, sitting straight in the throne’s hulking frame. “banishment is on the cards.” 

 

“on what grounds?” 

 

“treason.”

 

jeongyeon laughs edgily. “you scare me, nayeon. sometimes it almost feels like you mean what you say.” 

 

“get out of my throne room,” nayeon growls.

 

“is it not your father’s?” jeongyeon challenges. nayeon’s eyes are dark, furious, but beneath that facade, she’s a scared little girl who doesn’t know if her father will live or die. they all know this, and yet nayeon refuses to admit it. she can’t. it’d be losing to jeongyeon, and she’s made it a point not to do that as best as she can. 

 

“yoo jeongyeon.” 

 

“im nayeon.” 

 

nayeon’s fire dies rapidly, and in its place is a shy flickering spark. she loops the cord of the necklace around her fingers, looking away. 

 

“ _ please _ get out. i’m not in the mood for this.” 

 

she knows when she should back down. jeongyeon shakes her head, feeling a mix of pity and anger for the royal princess. it isn’t fair that jeongyeon is having her birthright denied, that nayeon will be recognized as the sole heir to the throne the moment the sickly fire lord passes, or that nayeon will have to ascend to the throne in the most tumultuous time of the war so far, rising to the post of commander-in-chief. 

she will be a puppet, jeongyeon thinks sadly, and shakes her head. smiles bitterly. maybe it’s not so bad that she won’t have the throne. “sit up straighter, nayeon.” 

 

“i will,” she thinks she hears nayeon whisper as she leaves. 

 

-

 

a certain sulky, short-haired girl brushes past sana as she’s making her way into the throne room. sana almost doesn’t stop to pay attention to the girl - she meets with hundreds of palace personnel in a day, what’s one more of them? - but something is different about her. 

 

“yoo jeongyeon?” she says loudly, startling the girl in question and stopping her in her tracks. “by agni, it’s really you!” 

 

“the one and only,” jeongyeon says dryly, and sana laughs, pulling her into a tight hug. 

 

jeongyeon appraises her with a nervous sort of look, even if she’s pretending to act all tough and unaffected by sana’s presence. no one on the palace grounds ever really knows what to do with sana. on one hand, she’s the governor’s daughter, and deserves their unbridled respect. but she is also the fire princess’ right hand, obviously more than just a best friend to her. in general, most of the palace would prefer to stay away from her. but she is also so  _ nice _ , and treats palace staff better than the royal family do, and how could anyone resist that? 

 

“so,” they say at the same time, “what are you doing here?” 

 

sana bursts out laughing, happy, joyous. it feels like it’s been forever since she and jeongyeon last spoke. she’s happy. 

 

“going to see nayeon, of course.” sana furrows her brows, “did she ask to meet you?”

 

jeongyeon nods. furtive glances, as if she’s worried the armor-clad soldiers might be listening in on them. sana knows she need not worry - the fire lord trusts few to relay him information. the  _ current _ , soon to be indisposed fire lord, that is. 

 

(there’s something they’re not talking about.) 

 

“i’m not sure what she wants from me,” jeongyeon explains, “she just called me in. we argued. i left.” 

 

“that sounds like the two of you,” sana snickers, looking off into the distance wistfully before she shakes her head. “she’s anxious. scared” 

 

“i know.” 

 

“she complains of palace officials trying to get her to approve dangerous missions,” she smiles. “they think she’s an easy girl to puppet. the fire lord is going to be furious when he returns.” it’s no secret that nayeon is the fire lord’s pride and joy, and that she will have no qualms about getting said officials banished.

 

except for one thing. 

 

“if he returns,” jeongyeon supplies. 

 

sana gives her a cryptic look and smiles wanly, stepping past her. “i’ll see you around, jeongyeon.” 

 

-

 

the thing about nayeon is that she can’t sit still. she cannot sit still, she cannot stop fidgeting, and she cannot stop talking. she’s been reprimanded, obviously. she’s been told off by tutors for running her mouth and for being unladylike, for not knowing how to sit with her legs together (she always whines about it being so much comfortable to sit with them spread wide open, and sana agrees). one of her more abrasive tutors threatened to scorch the skin off her face after she knocked an expensive salt shaker over at a diplomatic dinner. (said tutor was banished the moment the fire lord heard about it.) 

 

all this restless energy has to be channelled somewhere. it usually comes in the form of questions about her father’s policy decisions fired straight for sana. nayeon usually ignores the fact that sana is supposed to be ditzy, uneducated on politics. they both know it’s a ruse.    
  



	24. 99

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 361w. brooklyn 99 au that im posting that i have every intention of turning into a full fic lol

the precinct is a pleasant place this time of the year for a few reasons. 

 

firstly, nayeon is on vacation in france and took sana with her, in yet another bid to prove that they definitely aren’t dating - she’d said it so herself in the none too polite email to jeongyeon also that detailed several colorful ways she could use her baton if she didn’t approve their vacation. 

 

they won’t be back for a week, ensuring that none of them have to listen and watch sana stealing kisses under the guise of submitting reports to nayeon’s office. there’s a reason dahyun moved her desk as far away as possible from that place. jihyo just hopes they won’t break anything in france - nayeon had said something about a tight budget and not even being able to pay for the taxi that took them to the airport after paying for the trip. though that was almost certainly a lie and a puppy-eyed tactic for jihyo to give her a raise.

 

(which also assumes that jihyo has the power to. she’d laughed at the very insinuation.)

 

dahyun and tzuyu have been posted to another branch for the time being while their cubicles are being remodeled and scraped clean of all debris (long story). the absence of her partners in crime (tzuyu hates it when chaeyoung calls them that, but dahyun embraces the title eagerly) has sobered chaeyoung considerably, and jihyo feels almost bad for her, watching the small woman in an intense staring match with her monitor, fingers tapping against her mousepad in what is probably a cry for help. 

 

lastly, but not least(ly?), the vending machine was fixed last night. none of them know who called maintenance in, but they’re not complaining - soda tends to be one of the only things that soothes mina’s nervy, anxious moods. without it, she ends up pacing around her desk with case files in hand (meticulously arranged and labelled, of course, she’s not momo, who’s a brilliant detective but horrible at keeping things labelled correctly). it’s only been a week since she put jeongyeon in a headlock for daring to suggest that she was getting high-strung. 


	25. 98

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 737w, continuation of the b99 au. honestly too down to do much of anything these days so thisll probably be the last of this au and my writing for a while

From: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >

To: Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >

CC: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >, Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Request for leave of absence

 

12/2 - 19/2 

I’ll be in France with Sana

Thanks! :)

 

Im Nayeon (Sergeant) 

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force 

  
  


From: Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >  

To: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >

CC: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >, Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

That wasn’t a request. 

 

Yoo Jeongyeon (Inspector) 

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force 

  
  


From: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >  

To: Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >

CC: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >, Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

And yet you said nothing

 

Im Nayeon (Sergeant) 

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force 

  
  


From: Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >  

To: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >

CC: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >, Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

Ugh. I’m not sure if we can spare the two of you, though. Jihyo? 

 

Yoo Jeongyeon (Inspector) 

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force

  
  


From: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >  

To: Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >

CC: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >, Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

Fuck u 

 

Im Nayeon (Sergeant) 

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force 

  
  


From: Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >  

To: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >

CC: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >, Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

Fuck YOU 

 

Yoo Jeongyeon (Inspector) 

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force

  
  


From: Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >  

To: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >, Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >

CC: Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

I didn’t come back from vacation in the Alps for this. Please, stop clogging up my inbox. 

 

Nayeon, good job on cracking the most cases this month. We’re still looking into the Dongdaemun break-in case. Might put you in if the trail if Detective Myoui can’t get to the bottom of it by the time you get back. Your LOA is approved. 

 

Sana, have fun in Paris. Stay near from the edges of the Eiffel tower. 

 

Jeongyeon, you should know better. Actually, both you and Nayeon should know better. 

 

Thanks. 

 

Park Jihyo (Captain)

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force 

  
  


From: Minatozaki Sana < [ minatozaki_sana@gov.kr ](mailto:minatozaki_sana@gov.kr) >

To: Im Nayeon < [ im_nayeon@gov.kr ](mailto:im_nayeon@gov.kr) >, Yoo Jeongyeon < [ yoo_jeongyeon@gov.kr ](mailto:yoo_jy@gov.kr) >, Park Jihyo < [ park_jihyo@gov.kr ](mailto:park_jihyo@gov.kr) >

Subject: Re: Request for leave of absence

 

please take me off this mailing list!!

 

Minatozaki Sana (Officer)

Seoul Metropolitan Police Force 

  
  


This is not how Sana envisioned her dream vacation going. 

 

Yes, maybe they  _ did  _ take time off in the middle of July (crimes peak in summer, basic stuff they tell you about when you’re still in your officer diapers and can’t tell your left cuff from the right) for a romantic vacation to Paris. In their defense, though the precinct has been pretty efficient really, with a record-breaking number of cases solved in the past month, and they weren’t expecting much. The others are equally competent, and could easily cover for both of them. That is, unless the case in question happened to be something only the two of them, specifically, could deal with… 

 

“Who would’ve thought that the Myeongdong strangler case would re-open, huh? Guess he couldn’t wait for us to get back,” Sana jokes nervously, trying to assuage Nayeon’s angry muttering and shakes of her head. 

 

“Mm,” Nayeon grunts back, crossing her arms and sulking. 

 

She hasn’t seen Nayeon this annoyed since Momo mislabelled all the files for the Dongdaemun case. Even that hadn’t been too bad, considering that Nayeon only  _ threatened  _ to not let Momo out of the headlock instead of actually doing so. Sana wonders how long she’d be able to keep it up, anyway. 

 

Nayeon shifts angrily in her seat, and Sana suppresses a sigh. She’s been doing the same thing since they took off, and had only paused for the in-flight meal. Foil-wrapped sandwiches and pudding cups. Nayeon hadn’t even been in the mood to make a show of licking it clean without using her hands. 

 

She’s pretty much only paused to kick the seat in front of her and scribble more notes into her notebook. Only once does she stare adoringly at the ring adorning her fourth finger. 

 

In other words, this plane ride is going to be a long one. 


	26. forest

they’re pressed up against each other, voices lowered and urgent. nothing out of the ordinary, if not for the fact that they’re thousands of miles away from home and in the middle of a temporary shelter graciously offered to them by a group of women they just met. 

 

“this is a hippie cult in the middle of nowhere,” nayeon growls back, not squeezing back when sana grips her hand, “how am i supposed to be  _ chill? _ ” 

 

nayeon’s been… unreceptive, to say the very least. sana tries not to blame her. being together is about giving and taking, and sometimes sana has to take the fact that nayeon is paranoid and shifty about everything. she has a dozen hypotheses about what this group of women could be doing out in the wild. maybe they’re some type of sex cult. a human sacrifice group? has-been celebrities washed out by fame? the possibilities are endless, nayeon argues. 

 

and sana supposes she could be right. she won’t deny that these circumstances are… strange. it’s not every day you get rescued from the freezing cold and certain death after a hike gone wrong by a bunch of girls your age who are all too willing to take you in. but they’ve been nothing but nice to the two of them, and sana wants to repay the favour. it isn’t nice of them to be rude and snide. 

 

she sighs. “unnie, you’re being  _ rude _ -” 

 

“nayeon? sana?” both of them jump, coming face to face with a mildly amused jihyo. or at least, nayeon thinks she might be mildly amused. it’s difficult to tell when the full range of jihyo’s facial expressions seem to be the various directions she can quirk her lips. “it’s dinner time. you’re welcome to eat with us if you want to.” 

 

she nods politely, bowing out of the tent to leave them alone as quickly as she came, and nayeon sighs aggressively. 

 

“we are not having dinner with the creepy hippie cult.” 

 

“momo’s a good cook!” sana protests.

 

“oh great, they have names now,” nayeon huffs, rolling her eyes and being as difficult as possible as sana drags her off to the dining tent. 


	27. runner

"i'm so close," nayeon promises her receiver, "i just need one more week."

 

" _that's what you said last week_ ," jeongyeon sneers over the line, and nayeon's fingers squeeze around the receiver. she shouldn't be surprised at jeongyeon's curtness - she'd been furious when jihyo had assigned nayeon to take this case instead of her, and is now fully devoted to doing everything in her power to make nayeon's time on this mission hell on earth. " _we need answers, nayeon, and we need them now._ "

 

the line clicks off as jeongyeon unceremoniously hangs up. (a power play.) nayeon sighs, shoving the bureau-issued mobile phone deep into the recesses of her pockets.

 

beyond jeongyeon's temper, though, is the promise of more time. one more week to find the mark. she doubts that this week will help her further her case, seeing that she's made almost zero progress in the two weeks she's already spent at this lush beach resort. maybe their informants were lying. she doesn't trust them.

 

nayeon's always been more in favour of torturing information out of people rather than the whole witness protection direction jihyo prefers. sadly, only one of them is the boss in this situation, and it isn't nayeon.

 

she exhales, scanning the horizon and the group of partygoers stumbling along the dock. one of them falls into the sea, and surfaces a moment later to his friends jumping in. there are a lot of splashes, some harmless screaming that she's learnt doesn't mean anything.

 

she watches a twenty-something young woman laugh at the ditzy group, a sunhat over her face. does a double take.

 

"fuck," she whispers, because that's the mark.

 

 

 

she has a sunhat too, in time. she tells the bored teen manning the register to keep the change, clutching the hat close to her chest as she makes her way to the dock. the young woman's still there, and in her head, nayeon runs through the information on the case file she'd read on the way to the resort.

 

minatozaki sana. twenty-three, the same age as nayeon. the only daughter of the boss of a major crime syndicate operating out of bangkok, tokyo, and multiple other asian cities. sana's been kept out of the limelight and is currently a student at a fashion school in seoul, but they suspect she might have intel on her father and the syndicate. it's nayeon's job to worm that information out of her.

 

nayeon works the tension out of her shoulders as she approaches sana, donning the sunhat dutifully and wearing the brightest smile she can muster. this mission, while jihyo had stressed the importance of it going off without a hitch, was also a thinly-veiled excuse for jihyo to send nayeon on a vacation. she'd said something about nayeon being too obsessed with her work, which is big coming from _jihyo_.

 

"can i sit here?" she asks politely, smiling down at sana. she doesn't miss the way sana's eyes skate down her body, and resists the urge to preen. "it's so warm out."

 

"of course," sana says, looking surprised at nayeon's appearance, but obviously not minding much. she pats the area beside her. "you like watching people fall into the water too, huh?"

 

nayeon hums, sitting down face-flushingly close to sana and wondering what sort of small talk she can make next, "yeah. love it."


	28. d&f

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> an end to the cop aus

In hindsight, a good apology is the last thing she should’ve expected from Yoo Jeongyeon. 

 

“You’re back on the force,” Jeongyeon says gruffly, cuffing Nayeon by the ear. There’s a rough sort of affection in her voice, and Nayeon blinks blearily up at her, still woozy from just having let Jeongyeon into her home at eight-am in the morning. She’s still working off a killer hangover (blame Yerim and her four party animal friends) from the previous night, so forgive her for not responding in the most professional of ways to Jeongyeon’s sudden arrival. 

 

“What?” She croaks. 

 

Jeongyeon rolls her eyes, wrinkling her nose as she steps a little further into Nayeon’s apartment. She closes the door behind her and takes a long, disappointed survey of the place. 

 

“You live in a garbage can.” 

 

Nayeon huffs, trying to ignore the fact that there are lights pulsating in her vision and she’s not actually sure whether this is a fever dream or not. “I don’t exactly have incentive to keep it clean.” She raises her eyebrows in what she feels is a pointed manner before flopping back on her couch. Her bones ache dully with excitement. 

 

“When will you stop associating your self-worth with your job?” Jeongyeon sighs, pressing the heel of her palm to her forehead. “Anyway, if that’s what gets you going, you’re back on the force. Jihyo’s lifting your suspension.” 

 

Nayeon punches the air triumphantly. “This  _ is  _ a fever dream!”

 

\--

 

“Captain,” Nayeon greets, flashing her badge to the assembled crowd of technicians and other cops she doesn’t recognize. “What’s going on?” 

 

Jihyo flashes her a thankless smile. Nayeon recognizes it well. This is Jihyo’s  _ This is a mess, we’re a mess and this case is going down the drain  _ face. “Detective. It’s good to see you back.” 

 

Her heart hurts. She forgot how it felt to be on the force. “No problem.” 

  
Jihyo beckons for Nayeon to follow her, and they walk through the crime scene. There are crime scene photographers milling about, dark looks on their faces. Despite that serving as some sort of warning, Nayeon is still shocked when she gets to the crime scene. 

 

“Jesus Christ.” 

 

“Yes,” is Jihyo’s clipped response. “Jesus Christ.” 

 

There’s blood everywhere. Some of it is still actively dripping into the harbour, if not for the fact that there is hardened white plaster blocking it. It looks like a kid spilled red and white paint all over the boardwalk. Nayeon wrinkles her nose at the thought. 

 

“The two victims before this were prostitutes,” Jihyo says, speaking briskly and keeping her voice low. “This girl is a college student. A freshman. M.O was the same, but this case is spiralling out of our hands as we speak. I want you on this case.” 

 

Nayeon nods, eyes already glazed over, mind processing the facts. She takes in the atmosphere, the people, and makes a few conclusions of her own. 

 

Firstly, this case is bigger than what the existing detectives on the case can handle, which is why Jihyo brought her on this case. Secondly, the detectives currently on this case are Jeongyeon and Sana, which means that it must be tricky. And lastly-- that a combination of their three talents wouldn’t be enough for Jihyo, and so- 

 

“I’m putting myself on this case, too,” her captain informs her, just as Nayeon comes to the same conclusion. She flashes her another mirthless smile as Nayeon sighs. “Good solve, detective.”


	29. st

“You prepared an instructional video?” Jihyo smiles, visibly relieved. She knew she could trust Nayeon to come through. The older detective is the perfect mix of serious and silly, and Jihyo feels foolish for thinking that she wouldn’t be able to walk their squad through this mission. Why didn’t she see it earlier? She- 

 

“No, an inspirational one. I don’t mean to educate.” Nayeon pulls the velvet cloth off, revealing a 42-inch flatscreen TV that she’d gotten Mina and Chaeyoung to set up earlier in the day (the wires were too many different colours). “Watch and learn, fools.” 

 

The screen flickers to life, much like the way one falls asleep - slowly, then all at once. Nayeon frowns, squinting at the screen because it doesn’t look like what she was going to show them. For one, the entire title sequence is different - maybe she exported the older version of the file, the one without all the closeup shots of her face. She squats by the power outlet, jostling the plug a little just in case that’s the issue. 

 

There are gasps. Jeongyeon audibly curses. Someone drops their mug. 

 

Nayeon ducks her head out from the mess of wires to try to catch a glimpse of the screen, but she realizes she’s stuck. 

 

“What’s going on?” she barks, trying her best death glare even though no one’s looking at her. Dahyun has gone an impressive shade of bright red, and Nayeon snaps her fingers to get her attention, “Is the title sequence-” 

 

“That’s not, um, your inspirational video,” Sana mumbles. She, too, is flushed red, and Nayeon can’t begin to imagine why. Unless… 

 

“Unless you meant for you and Sana's sex tape to be inspirational,” Momo adds helpfully, and winces when Nayeon lets loose an impressive wail. 


	30. gold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy birthday mina :D heres your dose of minayeon fluff  
> psa mina turns everything she touches into gold

“I want to feel your hands,” Nayeon muses one day, as they’re sitting with their backs against the headboard. 

Their fingers are interlaced in the darkness of her bedroom, and Mina can’t see the older girl (entirely her own doing – Nayeon, in her characteristic way, had insisted that  _doing it in the dark is more exciting, Minari_ ), but she knows she’s smiling. Nayeon is always curious, always probing for more ways to get Mina to open up, and for whatever reason, Mina always accedes, gives her what she wants. 

It's not fair, how much power Nayeon has over her, but she's not complaining. 

"Minari," comes Nayeon's voice again, and she's so whiny that it's adorable. She cuddles closer to Mina, and not for the first time, Mina marvels at how  _warm_ Nayeon is. She shouldn't expect anything less, what with Nayeon having the gift of pyrokinesis and whatnot, but it's always a pleasant thing.

Nayeon is a pleasant thing. 

Mina nods against Nayeon's shoulder, humming. The gloves on her hands don't itch this time. "One day." 

Nayeon snorts, disbelieving. "Right." 


	31. echo

sana disappears on a rainy evening. there are grey storm clouds hanging in the sky like crestfallen stars when she leaves, scattered belongings neatly arranged in a backpack, her phone and wallet clutched in her hands. there is no reason for anyone to believe that she ever had any reason to be gone, and she knows it will complicate things. but somehow, she knows that she will evade detection in due time, and before anyone knows it, she will be a forgotten memory, like sunlit dust.

 

she crushes her phone in her palm as she crosses a bridge. the glass and plastic shatter in her hand, and she squeezes the shards. biology dictates it impossible, but sometimes, she wonders how it would feel like to be so fragile.

 

she crumples her credit cards, too, folds the plastic into little balls and sets them on fire with a zippo she’d nicked from the house of one stranger or another.

 

(she’s almost certain it had no emotional significance to its owner, but she can never be too sure. humans are such emotional creatures. a girl she was with for a while – jeongyeon? tall girl, with a bigger personality than sana ended up being able to handle – cried over losing a recipe for tofu that her grandmother had passed down to her. she eventually chased sana out of her apartment and her life when sana offhandedly mentioned that it didn’t matter because the tofu recipe was what it was.

 

a fucking tofu recipe.)

 

opening her palm, she briefly regrets destroying her phone so quickly. nayeon doesn’t like surprises.

 

no matter, because she knows how it goes. they both do.


	32. reincarnation au

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> was gonna be a full fic before i realized i hated it haha,, there are lots of gaps because i wrote it non-linearly

_let’s meet again._

 

or: mina and nayeon will never know home.

 

 

mina is part of the church’s choir, always smiling and optimistic, so it’s surprising that she has im nayeon as a best friend. the same im nayeon who plays softball at the state level and does muay thai on the weekends, whose brusque and moody nature make her difficult to get along with – it’s surprising how well the two of them go together. there isn’t anything different about nayeon when they’re together. she’s still gruff, and stubborn and reluctant to share her true feelings. but growing up together has been an exercise in letting the little things go, and keeping each other balanced.

 

nayeon is something of an outcast – if that’s what you call someone who outcasts themselves. a korean student studying in japan, she’s always felt out of place, and has supplemented her image with the same assumption. like some love story, mina is the only one who manages to get past that stubborn front. mina wonders what it is about her that makes her different from everyone else who’d tried to get nayeon to open up.

 

maybe it’s the fact that she’s never tried to change nayeon. sure, she disagrees with nayeon on things, but she never challenges them outright, and nayeon does the same.  

 

nayeon likes things that mina doesn’t – fact. mina likes things that nayeon doesn’t – also fact. it’s a peaceful, invigorating coexistence they have in their bubble this corner of the world.

 

-

 

 “flowers!” mina chirps one morning, and looks to nayeon with wonder in her eyes, “let’s go pick some?”

 

the flowers in question are pale yellow and pink petals scattered in a field, the same field they pass when walking to school. this spring is the first time mina’s seen these flowers bloom. she’d assumed that this entire field was pale yellow all the time, decaying grass and hay left around. turns out she was wrong.

 

nayeon shakes her head instantly, rolling her eyes as mina’s expression grows crestfallen. “please, minari, they’re hideous. the grass is wet – you’re gonna get stains all over your dress.”

 

mina deflates, but keeps her eyes on the flowers.

 

-

 

mina is in love with nayeon. has been since she was a little kid, when they first met, even if she didn’t know it yet. she’s loved nayeon through her rebellious phases, through her destructive phases where she tinkered in bouts of pyromania, through her lovestruck phases, where she’d talk about girls she found gorgeous on the playground. it’s not something mina can explain, but she’s felt drawn to nayeon since the very day she met her.

 

“so who do you like?” nayeon would ask in frustration as they lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling, bodies so close mina could smell her shampoo. “i don’t even know if you like girls or guys yet, minari.”

 

“no one,” mina would lie, only smiling when nayeon would call her out for lying, because _of course you like someone!_

 

but maybe nayeon feels drawn to her, because every chance she’s had to leave mina, she hasn’t. even in high school, as different groups of people form around the two of them, nayeon refuses to leave mina’s side, appearing at her doorstep to walk her to school without fail. she’s fiercely protective and loyal, and will stop at nothing to have her voice heard. it’s something mina loves about her.

 

so mina comes up with the best conclusion she can, with the evidence and facts presented to her – that she and nayeon are just a force of nature, two people who were fated to stick together against all odds. it brings a smile to her face to think about.  

 

-

 

nayeon is fretting in the locker room about the upcoming game when mina sneaks in.

 

a few yellow and pink flowers are shoved into nayeon’s face, and she can’t process it, eyes flicking from the flowers to mina’s flushed cheeks and then back to the flowers. they’re not particularly pretty flowers, but nayeon recognizes where they’re from. the path they pass by daily on the way to school – the same flowers that mina keeps staring at, even when it’s raining and they’re running for shelter. the same flowers that mina is too stubborn to let go.

 

“minari-“

 

“i just wanted to say good luck,” mina mumbles, “for tonight.”

 

it’s not exactly traditional for athletes to be handed bouquets of flowers before matches, but nayeon has learnt to expect the unexpected from mina. she smiles softly, heart thudding against her chest, “thanks. i’ll look for you after the match?”

 

mina nods, already getting ready to leave, but nayeon feels like she has one more thing to do, “minari?”

 

“yes?”

 

quickly, nayeon presses a kiss to mina’s cheek, and smiles, enjoying the way mina seems to go into shock for a moment, freezing up against her. “see you later.”

 

-

 

as fate would have it, they drift apart after high school, having pursued different dreams and taken separate paths. nayeon travels to australia to study design, mina staying in tokyo for a biochemistry course. they promise to stay in contact during graduation, but that promise wears thin, and soon, they go weeks, months without contact.

 

mina has always been more wrapped up in her work, so it’s nayeon who eventually rekindles the friendship by asking her to show her around tokyo, in a message on facebook. mina is incredulous at first – they’d _grown up_ in tokyo together. but she quickly realizes that it’s a shameless attempt at becoming friends again.

 

all the feelings come back. mina had spent a good amount of time after high school trying to let go of them, to tell herself that she was no longer secretly enamoured with nayeon. they would move on to different stages of their lives, and mina tried to make herself understand that.

 

it hadn’t worked.

 

-

 

they are twenty-four when they decide to go on vacation together during winter break. it’s a trip to the beach, with nayeon promising to teach mina how to rollerblade and vowing to have her master the sport by the end of their week-long vacation. that, honestly, was what spurred mina on to accept her invitation – the promise of nayeon patiently taking her through the steps was too much to resist.

 

“come on,” nayeon shouts, making a come hither motion with her hand, “just try moving!”

 

this is not what mina had in plan. she takes one trembling step forward, then another, cursing herself for agreeing to this. “nayeon!”

 

nayeon laughs that same devious laugh, skating over to mina to steady her by the hips. for a moment, they stay like this, oddly domestic in the way nayeon’s breath skates over mina’s neck and the way her hands are poised on her hips, but it lets up quickly enough, with another one of nayeon’s loud laughs echoing in her ears.

 

“i’m right here. don’t worry, just move.”

 

“fine. but if i fall, then i swear-“

 

“then i’ll go down with you,” nayeon breathes, and mina curses herself.

 

-

 

however, as destiny would dictate it, their happiness together is cut short by a car accident in the middle of nowhere. they’re thrown out of the car, through shattered glass and into a tree, and it becomes apparent quickly that nobody is coming to save them.

 

mina flits through several emotions as she feels herself dying, as she watches the girl she loves dying in front of her. pain, fear, horror that things went south so quickly. she curses herself for not telling nayeon to slow down. she curses herself for agreeing to come on this trip. she curses fate for not giving her more time to savour with nayeon, to enjoy this life. she’d done everything _right_.

 

 _this can’t be the end_ , she wants to say, but her energy is fast draining from her. she locks eyes with nayeon, though, and nayeon understands, as she always has.

 

“let’s meet again,” nayeon murmurs, blood bubbling out of her mouth and dripping onto the ground. her wounds are fatal, and it’s a supernatural force that keeps her awake, hand carding weakly through mina’s hair. it’s sticky with blood, but nayeon doesn’t care, not as mina slips away into the netherworld with a shudder. she blinks hard. “let’s meet again, in another life.”

 

then nayeon is gone too, leaving only the wind to blow.

 

-

 

in the next life, mina is a popular singer, entering the korean music industry as a solo artist and somehow making it big, leaving her high school classmates and high school sweetheart (nayeon, obviously, who manages to grow up with her in this lifetime) behind to strut the stages of the world. nayeon, meanwhile, remains an opportunistic singer and wedding performer, otherwise working a cushy job as the manager of a small café in hongdae. she might also be dating one of the biggest solo artists in the industry, which makes it even cushier.

 

it’s a good lifestyle, and it’s even better when mina manages to score free autographs from nayeon’s favourite singers for her. (mina gets whiny and pouty if nayeon declares that she prefers other singers to her.) most nights, nayeon and mina live the high life, dining and drinking well.  

 

“here you go,” nayeon says gruffly, thrusting the biggest bouquet she could find at the florist’s into mina’s face. mina is still in her stage outfit, her eyes rimmed with glitter and makeup, her lipstick still glossy, and it is definitely going to stain when she pulls nayeon close to her chest to hug her. nayeon wants to kiss her, but she understands the situation, the unspoken message in the fast-dissipating tension in mina’s back – _not here_.

 

the bouquet falls to the floor with a dejected thump, and mina detaches herself from nayeon quickly to pick it up. not even looking at the flowers, she hugs nayeon again, “they’re beautiful, thank you.” a small smile tugs at the corner of her lips, “i thought you weren’t one for flowers?”

 

nayeon’s distaste for flowers has followed her into this life. she turns her nose up at the most elaborate of displays, and maintains that she does _not_ need flowers to know that someone loves her. but she also knows that mina loves flowers, and so had spent half an hour asking the florist which bouquet would help profess her love the best. when that fell through, she picked up the most expensive one.  

 

“yeah, i still hate them,” nayeon deadpans, holding mina close and probably in the view of too many people.  

 

-

 

in the next life, they exist as friends with benefits, meeting at a gala organized by one of mina’s relatives.

 

mina’s apartment is sparsely decorated, except for a few paintings here and there. some of them, she tells nayeon, have been passed down in her family for generations. others, like a copy of a greek painting prominently displayed above her dining table, were handpicked from thrift stores. if it were nayeon, they would’ve been prints bought off amazon’s _lifestyle_ tab. but it was mina, and so nayeon has to eyeball aphrodite and cupid’s faces every time she comes over for a drink.

 

she supposes the painting is meant to bless their budding relationship, or whatever they want to call it. calling what they have a relationship feels too surface-level at this point – nayeon feels like a sham just saying the words. they stopped having to learn the intimate details about each other, each other’s wants and dislikes a long time ago. from lifetime to lifetime, the minuscule details change – like what sort of environments they grow up in, to the schools they attend – but nayeon’s cared less and less as time passes.

 

all she cares about now is that mina’s with her, solid and flesh and bone. it reassures her, dissuades the nightmares that plague her every second she can’t find mina. a side effect of her curse – she has regular, frightening nightmares every lifetime till she manages to find mina, slowly going insane unless she can find and charm mina fast enough. there were lifetimes where she rotted into a human skeleton, mina having evaded her grasp. mina doesn’t seem to have the same affliction.

 

nayeon brushes her fingers over mina’s hip, the same way she’s done so many times, and mina still freezes before laughing and swatting nayeon’s hand away. she’s always been so ticklish, and nayeon has always taken full advantage of it, even if they aren’t giggling teenagers who’d just learnt what erogenous zones were any more. “unnie, i’m trying to focus.”

 

“i don’t know what i’m doing,” nayeon says innocently, putting her arms around her and nuzzling her head into the crook of mina’s neck. they stay like this, quiet and mina not bothering to reply to nayeon, pressed against the counter. nayeon stares down at the boiling pot of soup.

 

-

 

looking at that damn painting of aphrodite and cupid, nayeon can’t help but roll her eyes. “i hate that thing.”

 

“hating a painting that depicts love?” mina muses, twirling her wine glass in between her fingers. nayeon watches bemusedly – she’s always wanted to learn how to do that. “how ironic.”

 

“yeah, well, i hate it.”  

 

“there is not much separating love and hate,” mina says sagely, staring at her feet. even in this life, she is introspective, patient and understanding, and nayeon hates that she never seems to change. because it applies to both of them, and applies to all their traits: mina is forever wise and stubborn, and nayeon is always passionate and reckless.

 

it’s like the girl from all those lifetimes ago, the girl nayeon first fell in love with, is here right now, just in a different form, in a different time period. the mina who would pick flowers for her because nayeon never had the patience to engage in such a petty act, the mina who folded a thousand paper cranes for nayeon with a declaration of love written on each crane – she’s still here, somewhere.

 

“they’re both feelings we can’t control. which is people who love or hate with their entire hearts are difficult.”

 

this feels like a thinly-veiled attack at nayeon’s _difficult_ nature, and she snarls, “that’s not fair.”

 

“isn’t it?” mina looks at nayeon, and it’s in this moment that nayeon realizes just how much she _hates_ mina. she hates the way mina is so fixed in her ways, how she seems to patronize nayeon when she thinks (knows) she’s right, how her love for nayeon has come in so many different, hard to interpret ways that nayeon has missed the mark for centuries. she is never straightforward, never forthcoming, and nayeon hates it, _hates it._ she hates _her_ for being this way.

 

most importantly, she hates destiny for doing this to her. for nudging her into a fate where she falls in love with mina every single lifetime. for sending her into this spin cycle, for her to learn- _what_? what is she meant to learn before she can stop this cycle of madness, of pain and love and hatred?

 

glaring mina down now, she still doesn’t know. and as is her nature, as she’s been doing for the past thirty lifetimes, she deflates.

 

“i hate you,” nayeon says. she feels like she’s about to explode. “and i mean it. i hope we never meet again.”

 

mina only gives her a sad smile, unsurprised by nayeon’s sudden swing, and lets her storm out of her apartment.  


	33. lockdown

**one**

lockdown is at the same time every day, at exactly a quarter before nine. it’s an easy constant to remember and is late enough for the girls to get their affairs in order before bed. the routine is the same every day, too – bars come down on all of their doors, and anyone not in their room is called out immediately and dragged back with all the respect one might give to a mangy dog.

 

today, sana messes up.  

 

at half past eight, jihyo pushes sana up against her headboard, an uncertain glint in her eye. sana doesn’t know whether it’s dirty arousal or plain nervousness in jihyo’s face – it’s certainly all of the former for her. “lockdown’s in fifteen minutes. are you sure you want to do this?”

 

to which she replies, “are you kidding?” and pulls jihyo back down with her, lips already finding hers. in hindsight, she really should have insisted on them using her room because jihyo is a much faster sprinter than her and might have made it back to her room on time.

 

and not gotten tased in the neck for not doing so.

 

“sana,” sunmi sighs, her shoe pressed against sana’s back. sana jerks when the tip of sunmi’s steel-toed boot press against her spine. her body is still twitching from the shock delivered, but their warden seems to pay that no mind, “i _really_ don’t want to make this a habit.”

 

sana would reply, of course, if she hadn’t just been fucking tased.

 

-

 

dahyun finds it hilarious, and makes sure to announce it to their entire friend group.

 

“you should’ve seen her,” dahyun cry-laughs, “she was just lying there and-“

 

sana snarls, “you weren’t even there-“

 

“the look on her _face_!” dahyun pantomimes wiping a tear from her cheek, “and all while jihyo watched.” a revelation seems to hit dahyun the same time it does the rest of the lunch table.

 

“hey, what _was_ sana doing in jihyo’s room so late?”

 

**two**

“weather patterns,” mina says, voice soft. she speaks with a candor that makes chaeyoung want to trust her. “when i was a kid i used to influence the weather patterns with my emotions. they keep me here so they can keep me under control.”  

 

“what’d you do, made it rain too much one time?” chaeyoung laughs at her weak attempt at humor.  

 

“half my town died in a tornado,” there’s that matter-of-fact tone again, and chaeyoung regrets ever asking.  

 

**three**

“you’re the last piece,” tzuyu says gravely, and the look in her eyes tells chaeyoung that she isn’t kidding around this time. tzuyu is more grounded than the rest of them, unlike nayeon and jeongyeon, who are all laughs and jokes, or dahyun, whose capacity to come up with pranks is unparalleled. “they told us we’d be complete when there were nine of us.”

 

complete. whole. those are words chaeyoung likes. it sounds safe, but she gets the feeling it is anything but. a feeling of dread creeps up her spine. she’s only been here a day, but she’s getting a sense of the state of things around her. this isn’t a ‘care facility’ like her parents were told.

 

they’re not healing them – they’re preparing them for something. for something big.

 

**four**

“nayeon can control reality,” jeongyeon tells her one night before lockdown. “it’s why you shouldn’t get too cosy with her, or piss her off – she can manipulate what you see.”

 

“why are you telling me this?”

 

jeongyeon shrugs. “why tell you anything?”


	34. Chapter 34

"we need to get out soon," sana says, pulling her drawstring bag open and tossing two paper bags her and chaeyoung's way. "we have five minutes."

 

"i'm a slow eater," jeongyeon tells her uneasily.

 

sana shrugs, "too bad."

 

jeongyeon looks to chaeyoung for moral support, but the younger girl shrugs too, already used to sana's devil-may-care tendencies. she's not as nice as one might think her to be, her manner of speaking curt and clipped by necessity. it's sad when chaeyoung makes mention of the sana from the past, when things were happier and they weren't constantly on the move all the time.

 

the privilege of sana's politeness is afforded only to chaeyoung - jeongyeon doesn't miss the almost imperceptible way her eyes soften when she looks at chaeyoung. borne out of genuine love and friendship or ugly necessity, she'll never know.

 

breathe, jeongyeon tells herself. she hasn't done anything wrong, nothing to make sana hate her. sure, she might have thrown her into this situation, but that's not something she needs to know... any hostility would only be exacerbated, and jeongyeon isn't looking for that sort of thing right now. get out of here, and back to seoul. then she can think of what she's going to do next.

 

like whether they're going to keep dancing around each other, pretending they've never met, that they're people with one friend in common. sana is doing a wonderful job at being indifferent, but jeongyeon wonders when it will all crash down. as it has before. as it's doomed to again.  

 

"sana does this all the time," chaeyoung explains as jeongyeon chows down on the food as quickly as she humanly can. it's dry stir-fried noodles and chicken, and jeongyeon has to swallow to get it all down. "she calls it a shame meal. pick up food in a paper bag, disappear into a corner and eat everything before leaving. it's like a tv dinner but even sadder."

 

"you're sad," sana corrects, eyes flicking with tell-tale nervousness to the plaster ceiling. her gaze hides more than it tells.

 

sana looks like she knows every route in and out of this place just by looking around it, and jeongyeon wouldn't be surprised if that turned out to be the truth. she isn't sure of the exact nature of the things sana and chaeyoung have gone through, but she has an idea. normal, uneventful people with uneventful lives don't have random bullet casings they keep in their wallets as mementoes.

 

("i got this in brazil," chaeyoung smiles, handing the bullet casing to a horrified jeongyeon. "the lady who shot this at me was kind of hot. oh no. she died. can i say that sort of stuff?")

 

she's doing it again. pretending. it's what she does best, and it's what's kept her safe, but it still sucks. she wonders if sana knows.

 

"five minutes is up," sana says, not looking at her watch.

 

jeongyeon opens her mouth to protest, "you-"

 

sana scrambles to her feet, chaeyoung already rising to follow her. "we're leaving."  

 


	35. Chapter 35

momo has always been a lover, not a fighter. nayeon has always been a fighter, not a lover. nothing even close to what a lover is.

 

she doesn't mind, she thinks. it's not that bad of a life, to be picked up and thrown around as nayeon fancies. it would be unfair to cast nayeon in a purely bad light. she treats her well, sometimes. she always tries her best, even when she's aware that she's going to end up hurting momo in the end.

 

this is how they live, trying to keep their balance on a swinging platform. there's no other way for them.

 

-

 

her heart hurts so much, burning and suffocating in her chest with pain she's never felt. thinking about what they're doing now is only making it worse.

 

so in the heat of the moment, momo lashes out, "did you sleep with her?"

 

_do you love her?_

a look of irritation flits across nayeon's eyes, and she presses closer to momo (as if she wants to make her forget), biting out, "is this really the time?"  

 

momo looks away then, her fragile, fluttering heart on its last legs, suddenly feeling very small and used. she'd always known, of course, that she wasn't the only one in nayeon's life - the older girl is too much of a wanderer, a drifter, to be kept down by one person. it still hurts.

 

noticing momo's distant eyes, nayeon sighs.

 

"no, i didn't," she tells her quietly, "so get on with it."

 

she doesn't miss the way momo's eyes light up in excitement.

 

 


	36. Chapter 36

"i want to create something beautiful," mina tells her, "but my expectations are too high. i don't know what it means to be beautiful."

 

"you think God knew what beauty was when He made the stars?" nayeon smirks at mina's expression. "my point is that you should quit trying to think of what beautiful  _might be_ , and focus on what it  _will be_. you'll never get anything done if you don't try."

 

with any other person, mina would get angry, ask nayeon if she really thought she hadn't tried. the discarded sketches are testament to mina's efforts and the dozens of times she's failed. somehow, with nayeon, she can think of no protest, and settles for nodding numbly. she's right, in a way. mina hadn't thought of that before.  

 

in an act of protest, she nods towards the half-finished canvas in the corner. "that's hideous."

 

"then make it beautiful," nayeon breathes. she's captivating, brilliant in the light. mina doesn't think she's ever loved someone this much, and so little at the same time, nor does she think she ever will again. nayeon is someone whose existence she can't even begin to contemplate, because the words in her throat die when she tries to describe her, her own thoughts choking themselves into silence out of shame for not being able to do her justice. she makes mina's head spin.

 

these things are things she should tell nayeon, instead of the utterly uninteresting, mundane things she tells her.  _yes, there's corn salad in the fridge_.  _i'm going to take a shower. do you need anything from the store?_

 

("yeah, get me a bunch of vitamins - i think i need more of vitamin you!"

 

"shut  _up_." mina had been genuinely worried about this fictitious vitamin deficiency.)

 

nayeon's fingers weave into her hair, the gentle rise and fall of her chest inducing some sort of drowsy trance in mina. she can barely stay awake to listen to what nayeon has to say, yet she hears her next words perfectly clear, as if she'd just been doused in icy water and forcefully dragged out.  

 

"can't you just try to be in love with me? just for a little."

 

her mouth opens and closes with the same uselessness she curses herself with. "i-"

 

"it's okay," nayeon murmurs, lulling her back to sleep, "it's okay."

 

it's not. mina wants to sit up and cover nayeon's mouth with her own, press her into the sheets until nayeon is calling out for her in pure want. she's been having too many of those thoughts recently, thoughts that make her dizzy with desire. it's embarrassing at the very least, and, at the very worst, makes her feel even more guilty for her feelings.

 

nayeon shouldn't have to put up with this - whatever they have between them. it isn't fair, to keep playing this game and have no clear winner, just dodging each other the best they can and tugging and pulling at each other's strings. if she were braver, perhaps she'd say something. but she isn't.

 

 _okay_ , mina mouths, and drifts.


	37. Chapter 37

the child of hades makes an appearance as sana's teaching dahyun how to swordfight properly.

 

standing in front of sana, the ghoulishly glowing sword at her hip radiating enough evil to make her step back, is the new girl. her appearance is not a welcome one - dahyun, daughter of hermes, disappears almost instantly on her enchanted running shoes (a gift from her father), and several of the poseidon kids, save from a stony-faced jeongyeon, begin tactfully bringing up how they have to feed their pegasi before it gets dark. they excuse themselves, but no one seems to notice or mind.  

 

even sana, brave as she lauds herself to be, has to grit her teeth and remind herself to stand her ground. it's not just stranger danger like jihyo had said - there's something dark and urgent about this demigod. there's a look in her eye that makes sana think that she might be able to hear the screams of the dead if she got too close, and that she could rip her soul apart with her bare hands. all if she got too close.

 

every cell in sana's body is screaming at her to run, to live up to her cowardly siblings' legacies and hightail it out of here. but she has her own legacy to spin, and it's that stubborn part of her that struggles out the words, "is there anything i can help you with?"

 

the girl - _nayeon_ \- seems to understand, on some level, that she isn't welcome here. if she does, then she doesn't give any indication of caring. (it must hurt.) "jihyo told me to take a walk around camp and check things out for myself."

 

even with her messed up hair and the dark circles under her eyes, nayeon still manages a measure of grace sana couldn't think up. not even aphrodite's blessing, the most divine of honours her mother could bestow on one of her children, could give nayeon the elegance she possesses. (aphrodite has a knack for fixing up the outside and leaving the inside as broken as it was before - mental health really isn't her strong suit.)

 

a disgraced princess, a hellhound with royal blood coursing through her veins - _that's_ what nayeon is. by virtue of being the daughter of hades, she's part of the big three, and should be afforded the same respect they give jeongyeon and jihyo here. but there's always been that... thing, with the sons and daughters of hades. they always seem to come with a little more baggage than intended.

 

the last time they had a child of hades... most of the current legionnaires aren't old enough to remember, like the ones who turned sixteen and joined the legion the year after chaeyoung and tzuyu, but some of them remember. the legion, itself, still bears scars, and there are certain areas of camp where things just feel _wrong_.

 

sana remembers.

 

-

 

dinner that night is a painful event, to say the least. there's a heaviness hanging in the air that can't be dispelled by the hermes kids playing pranks on the rest of the legion. there's a near miss when dahyun sneaks up behind jeongyeon and jeongyeon panics enough to douse her with all the water in a ten-foot radius, which makes things even more tense and uncomfortable.

 

no one wants to admit it, but the source of the discomfort is obvious - the child of hades sitting beside jihyo at the head of the table. jihyo must have convinced her to change out of the restricting armour she showed up to camp in, but her sword remains strapped to her hip, giving off that eerie purplish-black glow.

 

sana's not sure what material that is, but she knows that it's something Underworldly. all the light around it seems to be sucked straight into the blade instead of being reflected off it, like a reverse mirror, and she gets the feeling that it was built to trap souls. she would probably cower in front of it like the loser she is.

 

jihyo is the one who breaks the silence and soft murmuring, "war games in an hour. go and get ready, everyone." the impromptu declaration of the legion's favourite pasttime does a successful job of getting everyone's attention of nayeon and onto fighting each other with fake weapons and armour, and the tension seems to be relieved for a while.

 

even with momo excitedly chattering into her ear, sana can't focus on the happy news, staring straight ahead. her heart's felt heavy the whole day.

 

-

 

"chaeyoung won't talk to me," tzuyu mutters, rubbing the watch on her left hand. the watch is one of her most prized possessions, and was the first thing chaeyoung crafted after the war, after she healed and got back the use of her legs. jihyo has never seen her without it. "she hates the thought of nayeon coming along."

 

"and you agree with her?" jihyo presses, eyebrows knit together. tzuyu is non-confrontational by nature, and fiddles with her watch even more as if it could help her avoid jihyo's gaze. "tzuyu."

 

"i'm not comfortable with anyone that could pose a threat to chaeyoung."

 

"she doesn't-"

 

"you don't know that."

 

jihyo can find no rebuttal to that, because really, tzuyu is right. she doesn't.  

 

-

 

"we had a child of hades once," sana mumbles, staring at the ground as she forces herself to remember. for nayeon's sake, she tells herself, she has to. the only way they can learn from their mistakes is by recounting them, and warning themselves against them.

 

"yes. jihyo told me."

 

sana exhales, "his name was jaehyung. he was the same age as me. it happened two years ago, when we were eighteen. he caused a civil war within the camp and turned us against each other. it wasn't his fault - he was scared, just like the rest of us, but he wasn't good for us."

 

"and what happened to him?" nayeon asks.

 

here comes the horrible part. "we killed him. we had to. he was getting frighteningly powerful, and with hades' blessing on his side, he..." she drifts off, increasingly distracted by nayeon's agitated aura. she reminds sana of jaehyung, in a way, the same cold stare she's giving her now, and the dark air that seems to envelop her.

 

the ball drops, and sana curses herself, wishes she never spoke in the first place. every word feels like a step further and further into this minefield, where she's been thrown in blindfolded and mute.

 

"...you have hades' blessing, don't you?"

 

"my father told me i would need it for the road ahead, and that i'd be of great use to the people around me," nayeon says bitterly, standing up. she looks angry, _hurt_ , and for a selfish moment sana is afraid that she might raise her hand to strike her. but she only shakes her head in disappointment. "but you just see me as a threat, don't you?"

 

desperately, sana shakes her head, layering her voice with charm, (she wonders how many times nayeon's been hurt by people who don't trust her), "i'm sorry, i didn't know-"

  
"what?" nayeon snarls, "what did you not know?"

 

it might just be her, but sana swears she can feel the earth shake with every agitated breath nayeon takes. she's struck with a confusing cacophony of emotions, shame and guilt and fear of this person who she's pissed off, big time. in that respect, she will always be a child of aphrodite, selfish and self-serving, and she hates it.

 

nayeon scoffs when sana can only stare at her feet, "i knew it."

 


	38. Chapter 38

She's been on this ship for seven years, known Jihyo for even longer, and still, she has yet to figure out the methodology Jihyo employs when deciding who to send ashore. It's probably a mix of her mood and whether Uranus is in retrograde or not, because Nayeon has no-fucking-clue what else it could be. Maybe Jihyo just throws darts at the ship's organizational chart and taps on whoever it lands on to go on land.

 

None of them like being on land for too long, because that's just the sort of crowd they are, restless and wandering, hearts sinking with the anchors when they dock. Staying in a dock is bad enough, but going out to get supplies for the crew is the _worst_.

 

Occasionally, Jihyo gets grand ideas about staying in the harbor for days on end while she scours the docks for some type of magic potion or the other, and brings the rest of the crew on board (pun intended) with her. Once, they stayed docked for _two weeks_ because Jihyo heard someone in town had mastered the art of alchemy and could turn coal into gold. (Surprise - they hadn't, just mixed a few highly toxic and glowing chemicals together.)

 

Jeongyeon, who, thankfully, has a sensible head screwed onto her shoulders, is able to bring Jihyo back to earth when this happens, and will rein her in. For that, Nayeon is thankful, because she knows that if she was second-in-command, she'd have a lot less patience and a lot more blood on her hands. She's just an action-before-diplomacy sort of girl. Actions work a lot better than words.

 

Or maybe she's just really, really bad at talking, and would prefer to fight it out to cover that up. She's good at saying words. Just not stringing them into coherent sentences that make sense or that can hold up against the impermeable logic of the ship's captains.

 

"Three weeks?" She splutters, slamming her fists on the table. Jihyo and Jeongyeon seem to be in total agreement this time, which is bad. Nayeon has always been able to count on one of them to side with her. They make most of their decisions based on who Nayeon sides with, honestly. They need her. "You want to stay. Here. On land. For three weeks."

 

"I'm just saying it would be nice," Jihyo says patiently, "Everyone's getting a little sick of the sea."

 

"I'm not!" Nayeon hollers, "I love the sea! I'm sick of the ground, if anything. Fuck the ground."

 

She looks around desperately at the faces of the crew, trying to see if anyone is nodding along in agreement. Nope. Dahyun is nodding the most enthusiastically - she gets the most easily seasick and, though she likes being on the high seas, hates the feeling of the ship rocking beneath her. Chaeyoung seems to share similar sentiments. Momo, bless her non-confrontational and pacifistic heart, is avoiding meeting anyone's eye and doodling on her own hand instead. Even Mina - Nayeon thought they had a deal to back each other up, dammit! - shakes her head when she makes eye contact with Nayeon. _No avoiding this._

Nayeon groans, dramatically falling back the seat. "But why am I in charge of this... excursion?"

 

"Mission," Jeongyeon corrects, smirking when Nayeon gives her the evil eye.

 

("I am _not_ calling this a mission. This isn't a fucking Bond movie."

 

"It could be."

 

"I'd rather die.")

 

"I think it'll do you some good," says Jihyo, whose expression now makes her intentions to retire to her quarters and sleep very clear. She's obviously trying to hurry things along and get Nayeon out of her hair, and is now spouting "I believe in you" drivel. "You've been cooped up onboard for too long."

 

"Have not," Nayeon grumbles, but she's fighting a losing battle, and Jihyo nods cordially at all of them before passing out in her chair.

 

And that's how Nayeon's sent ashore - with a sack of gold coins, an intense yearning for her ship, and none of her crew on her side. Good fucking riddance.


	39. Chapter 39

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sanayeon au; nayeon is a cop who pisses off journalist sana

mornings at the precinct are a drowsy affair for everyone involved. today is no different - nayeon's practically falling asleep at her desk, anything and everything that jihyo had brought up at this morning's briefing (something to do with how she should pay more attention to her surroundings) already long forgotten. thankfully, today is a slow day - apart from a witness coming in at three, nayeon has nothing else to bother with.

 

jeongyeon breaks the monotony of the morning by walking in half an hour late and asking, "you heard of minatozaki sana?"

 

nayeon blinks, "who?"

 

"some popular journalist," jeongyeon says, shrugging off her jacket and taking her seat opposite nayeon. a copy of _the city_ is tossed onto nayeon's desk, "she's taken a particular interest in you. have you really not heard? five of my relatives sent me this article last night, and the article was only published at six in the evening."

 

"hmm." nayeon thinks. she'd gotten home at eight yesterday and had barely managed to get through her (extremely microwaved and extremely unpalatable) dinner before crashing on the couch, hard. that must be what all the notifications she'd woken up to are about. she'd just dismissed them as another one of facebook's not-a-notification notifications.

 

despite the apparent concern on jeongyeon's face, though, she doesn't really mind. they've all been criticized by the press before - nayeon hasn't experienced it personally, due to her wonderful track record of being an excellent detective, but jihyo and dahyun have weathered through their fair share of bad press - and aren't too bothered by it. she shrugs, "eh. i don't really care. she's harmless."

 

jeongyeon's eyes widen in disbelief, "she's a journalist. they're the _worst_ people, next to attorneys."

 

from across the room, dahyun grimaces, shaking her head, "attorneys are pretty bad."

 

"journalists help maintain the integrity of our media," nayeon replies, already looking away and at the pile of cases on her desk. it's impossible for her to pay attention to anything for more than thirty seconds these days. "let it go, jeong. what's the worst that could happen?"

 

"the captain wants to see you."

 

nayeon rolls her eyes, "attorneys are worse than that."

 

"no, really," and nayeon looks up to see the captain of their precinct staring at her through her office's blinds. "jihyo wants to see you."

 

-

_"Detective Im Nayeon, the head detective for the case, stated that the case was "impossible to work" at the nationally televised press conference in early August. The head detective on such an important case was unable to answer other similar questions, bringing into question the competence of the detectives we trust to protect and serve our people._

_My critics have asked me if I would be able to do any better - to which I say: It's not my job to do so. I'm not being paid to make sure the city's criminals are apprehended. It, however, is Im Nayeon's job to. Now, I'd like to us ask Detective Im Nayeon: Do you know what you're doing? And for how long do you think you can keep this up?"_

-

 

jihyo's office is pretty comfy. nayeon likes coming here when she has nothing better to do, just to chill out on the couch and read the monthly magazine jihyo's subscribed to (sudoku monthly - as if it was possible for jihyo to get even duller) with her legs up on the armrests. sometimes, she even finishes the puzzles.

 

"nayeon," jihyo sighs, nursing a mug of coffee and looking none too pleased about nayeon having insistently planted herself on the couch, "can you come over here?"

 

despite the fact that jihyo is her captain, she's younger than all the detectives on her squad - her premature promotion was a one-in-a-million case and led to her being elevated over her seniors. this causes a weird rift in the police hierarchy and would make her a total pushover if it wasn't for the fact that she made it a point to be a hard-ass, precisely to dismiss that assumption. still, nayeon and jihyo go way back, so jihyo finds it especially difficult to be stern with nayeon.

 

"it's so much better here," nayeon calls, locking eyes with jihyo over her desk. "come over here, jihyo. let's talk here."

 

jihyo sighs - nayeon can be _so_ stubborn when she wants to. she gets up from her seat, "fine."

 

nayeon still looks wary as she approaches, "so what is this about?"

 

"you don't know?"

 

"no?" nayeon's expression clears suddenly, as if she's suddenly remembered something. she shakes her head, "oh, is it the article? don't worry. i know exactly how to deal with it. i'll just ignore it."

 

jihyo grimaces. the copy of _the city_ had shown up on her doorstep this morning, bringing with it memories of being ridiculed and mocked for doing her job in the papers. with that, she did exactly what nayeon's suggesting now, but that was because those were no-name papers, written by no-name journalists. this isn't the same thing.

 

"that's the thing," she says uneasily, "you can't... do that this time. it's minatozaki sana we're talking about here."

 

"you and jeongyeon keep saying her name like i should care."

 

"yeah, you should." jihyo pulls the paper from her desk and tosses it at nayeon, "i have a feeling you haven't actually read the article yet."

 

"with all due respect, captain," nayeon rolls her eyes, "i don't need to read it. i know what it says. i handled something badly, i have to improve, yada yada." she spreads her hands, "i'll just work on whatever i did wrong, case closed. we're all happy."

 

"...is this an excuse to have me read to you?"

 

"yes."  

 

-

 

_"...thus concludes my examination of the case: The police department has set a worrying precedent by assigning such a scathingly incompetent detective to the case. If this keeps up, it will prove that we have nothing to look forward to, and that the standards of the department have dropped. I compel the department to re-examine the quality of their detectives, and re-consider their choice of Detective Im Nayeon as the head detective on the case._

_Minatozaki Sana for The City (msana@thecity.com)_

-

 

"this is bad," nayeon mumbles when jihyo finishes reading the article to her (she has embarrassingly little reading stamina, plus, she likes feeling like she's in an audiobook sometimes). now she understands why she'd looked so worried just now. a simple column about dahyun accidentally tripping a reporter was one thing. an eight-thousand word exposé on one single detective, by one of the most famous journalists in the city, is another.

 

she doesn't know what she did to attract minatozaki sana's wrath (even though it'd been pretty well outlined in the form of vicious remarks and analyses of her investigative skills) or why she's being targeted, but it leaves an uncomfortable feeling in her stomach. nayeon usually isn't one to be personally hurt by what others think of her, but this is... different. she doesn't like it.

 

"what should i do?" she half-asks, half-pleads with jihyo, "you've been in this sort of situation."

 

jihyo frowns, "honestly, the best thing might be to lay low for a while. it'll hurt for a bit, but hopefully things will blow over after a while. you might just have to live with your name being tainted."

 

she thinks for a second. two seconds. sure, she might be better off laying low. but that's a jihyo solution, not a nayeon one, and nayeon's had pretty good successes following her heart. (the nayeon solutions have also led her to being reported on by a very angry journalist, but that's a separate matter.)

 

"you're right," she decides, standing up, "i'm going to personally confront minatozaki sana."

 

"what? that's not what i said-"

 

nayeon finger-guns, walking backwards out of jihyo's office, "thanks, captain!"  

 

-

 

"yeah, you're not going up there."

 

nayeon frowns, clutching onto the badge hanging around her neck. she hasn't made an effort to conceal it, but she knows the public sentiment against cops. she, particularly, is a perfect caricature of a beat cop, reckless and impulsive and willing to do anything to get what she wants. she can only act civilized right now to gain the receptionist's trust, even if said receptionist is stuffy and stuck up and fully unimpressed with nayeon.

 

"what do you mean?"

 

"you can't go up there," the receptionist, whose sleek nametag reads _chou tzuyu_ , repeats. "sana- miss minatozaki has appointments the whole day."

 

"but she wrote an _article_ about me," nayeon agonizes, leaning over the desk and causing the other woman to wrinkle her nose and reach for the hand sanitizer on her desk. "i _deserve_ an audience with her."

 

"miss minatozaki writes about lots of people. just tweet her like everyone else."

 

nayeon narrows her eyes, pressing both her palms to the counter, "listen, tzuyu- how do you even say your name? tzuyu? tzuyu, whatever. just let me talk to her for a moment, i need to straighten something out with her."

 

tzuyu folds her arms, wrinkling her nose like some snob, "i can see why she wrote an article about you."

 

"what? who are you even to say that," nayeon growls. "call her right now and tell her i'm coming up."

 

the receptionist shakes her head. "no."

 

"do it!"

 

"no."

 

nayeon gnashes her teeth, but tzuyu continues to look unimpressed. it's at this moment that the prettiest woman on earth walks out of the elevator, and towards the reception.  

 

nayeon's knees actually go a little weak when she sees her. she hadn't expected anyone working here to look other than pure evil, so this is surprising indeed. this is the most beautiful woman she's ever had the pleasure to set her eyes on - and she's found her right in the lion's den. 

 

the woman's eyebrows raise when she sees nayeon, and nayeon doesn't miss the way her eyes skim downwards quickly, or the way the corner of her lip quirks up in a smirk. "tzuyu, you called?"

 

tzuyu looks like she'd want to be anywhere but here right now. "yeah. this cop wants to see you. i tried to tell her that she'd need an appointment, but she refused to leave."

 

"it's okay. i'll deal with her. im nayeon, isn't it?" the woman smiles, holding out her hand. "i'm minatozaki sana." 

 

-

 

"my god," nayeon seethes, feeling her head spin with how annoyed she is, " _you_."

 

"me," minatozaki sana smiles back, pleasantly, nodding at tzuyu as she nods for nayeon to follow her back to the elevator. "i've been looking forward to meeting you for the longest time, detective."

 

"really, now."

 

"yeah! i've had my eye on you for so long, you have no idea." the way sana speaks is crisp and cultured, and nayeon finds herself envying everything about her. at the same time, she's reassured. sana is just some sheltered ivy league journalist who works in a sleek skyscraper and writes exposés about detectives who she doesn't truly understand. nayeon will just talk sana out of her misguided hatred, and everything will be fine for her. "thank you for coming here."

 

nayeon nods slowly, still not quite comprehending the situation. and as is custom, she doesn't hold back, "don't you hate me?"

 

"hate is a strong word," sana purrs, pressing the button for the top floor. the elevator begins ascending smoothly - miles from how the elevator at the precinct shudders if you press the close button too hard. "i just disagree with how you've been doing things, and how you handled your cases. it's all very professional disagreements, you see. though i'm not surprised you couldn't not take it personally."

 

she feels her hackles raise, all thoughts of civil confrontation flying out of the window, "what does that mean?"

 

the elevator dings, revealing an open floor with floor to ceiling windows, with equally pretty offices side by side. figures that the best journalist at _the city_ would have pristine working conditions. she shares this area with a few others - nayeon recognizes the likes of son chaeyoung and myoui mina, journalists whose names she recognizes from discussions at the precinct, sitting in large offices, their names emblazoned on the door in gold lettering.

 

nayeon hates it. this place reeks of privilege and detachment and everything nayeon doesn't have. she sees none of the _journalistic integrity_ and _real life experiences_ these journalists claim to possess, just the smug arrogance they all have. _i'm better than you!_ sana seems to say with every sway of her hips, and nayeon hates it.

 

she's decided five minutes into this encounter that she hates everything about sana and her lifestyle.

 

"i mean, you're a cop," sana smirks. "you guys are pretty bad at separating your work and your personal lives. where do you think all the stereotypes come from? broke cop, drunk cop, messy cop."

 

"that is... the worst thing i've ever heard," nayeon growls. the two of them stop at the elevator lobby, nayeon putting herself right up in sana's face. sana's a lot taller than she is, but she pretends not to notice, tiptoeing indignantly, clutching her badge, "look, i don't know who you are, but i'd like you to stop making assumptions about me and what i do."

 

"i don't make any assumptions," sana replies, and though she'd started off smiling, there's a dangerous look in her eyes. "i just report on the facts. now, if you're done getting angry at me, i brought you up here for a reason."

 

nayeon gnashes her teeth again, following sana into her office. the door closes behind her with a soft click, and sana smiles at her again. "you're interesting, detective. i've reported on lots of incompetent cops, but i don't think you're incompetent. i think you're a good story."

 

"me?" nayeon chokes, hating the easy way sana seats herself on her couch. it looks like it's not used much, save for when sana wants to give off the impression that she's a fun person and not secretly an exposé-writing lizard human. "i don't know what you're talking about." a thought occurs to you, and she narrows her eyes, "bet that gets your cop-hating ass off, huh?"

 

"feisty," sana coos, "how cute."

 

nayeon can't help but shudder a little when sana moves imperceptibly closer to her. she's never met someone who she's disliked so much, but at the same time was so physically drawn to. she wonders why only she seems to be so tongue-tied while sana is still all smirks and smooth talk.

 

still, she can do one thing, and it's what she does best. she stands up, "if you have nothing else for me, i'm leaving." _leaving this beautiful high-rise office and getting back to my five-storey precinct and my miserable, but fulfilling, job._ "good day, miss minatozaki."

 

sana rises from her seat, eyebrows knitting together, "wait, nayeon- can i call you nayeon?"

 

"no. goodbye."

 

and then she leaves.

 

-

 

"-and then she asked me if she could call me nayeon," nayeon runs an anguished hand through her hair, "who even _does_ that?"

 

she takes a moment to catch her breath, her assembled squadmates looking extremely sympathetic to her plight. momo had only interrupted her once just now to ask if sana was as hot as her author's bio made her look, and had made the appropriate sympathetic sound when nayeon mournfully snapped at her to focus on what was important.

 

"journalists," dahyun shakes her head, "journalists and attorneys. they both suck."

 

jeongyeon is about to say something when a delivery boy walks into the bullpen, "delivery for im nayeon!"

 

she turns around to see the delivery boy with a massive bouquet of roses, and then back to her squad, just to make sure that none of them are laughing. this has to be a prank, "i think you have the wrong im nayeon-"

 

"no, it says here it's for detective im nayeon," the boy says, holding out a clipboard and a pen for nayeon to take. "with compliments from miss minatozaki."

 

the precinct gets so silent you could hear a pin drop, and heads turn - some of them weren't even within earshot, so this is proof that nayeon's living in some sort of sitcom. "what?" she repeats dumbly, "what?" as she signs for the package. "this is a joke."

 

"kinda wish these jokes were played on me," the delivery boy shrugs, walking off and leaving nayeon with the bouquet in her hands. there's a card attached.

 

_see you soon!_

_-sana_  


	40. Chapter 40

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my kink? broken sajeong who slowly get back tgt uwu

jihyo brings sana to jeongyeon in the wee hours of the morning, appearing on her doorstep with the girl hanging off her shoulder, totally hammered. jeongyeon can't tell whether the smell is coming from jihyo or sana. either way, jihyo invites herself in, walking past a sleepy jeongyeon and shrugging sana off onto the couch.

 

"what are... you doing," jeongyeon blinks, watching jihyo pull her shirt up and over her head. she isn't fazed by the casual nudity - jihyo and her just have that sort of relationship - but rather the suddenness of this entire situation. jihyo usually has the decency to call ahead and tell her that she's dropping by. and never with sana, too. come to think of it, jeongyeon hasn't seen sana in a while, whether out of jeongyeon's own isolationist tendencies or sana's newfound obsession with partying all the time. "are you staying the night?"

 

jihyo disappears into jeongyeon's room and comes out with her head stuck in one of her shirts. jeongyeon buys her shirts big, a fact all her friends have come to appreciate. "yeah. we walked here from nayeon's."

 

jeongyeon glances at sana. jihyo's propped her up so she won't choke, and she's snoring, chest rising and falling with every breath. it reminds jeongyeon of too many things, because that's the sort of person she is. maybe jihyo knows that, is trying to stitch the fabric of fate in her meddling way again. "why did you bring her here?"

 

"she's with me," jihyo replies, rolling her eyes when jeongyeon gives her a hard look. "she just went to the party with me, jeong."

 

"well," jeongyeon pauses. "take her with you in the morning. she's not my problem."

 

"whatever."

 

as jihyo heads off into the bathroom, jeongyeon stares at the crumpled figure on her couch, trying to condense the emotional mess in her chest into something coherent and respectable. she wonders if this is jihyo trying to tell her something, one of her less-than-subtle master plans that she concocts to draw the people in her life together. sana and jeongyeon were a result of one of jihyo's grand plans, and that didn't have the best of consequences.

 

"you're not my problem," jeongyeon tells her, voice stinging and hard.


	41. Chapter 41

**prologue**

the bandages wrapped around chaeyoung's knuckles are dripping with blood.

 

she winces as tzuyu fusses over her, holding her hands in place as she tends to the wound. tzuyu doesn't have the healing powers of the medics they'd met in the rebel camps - being a waterbender is a huge advantage in that domain - but she'd learnt helpful first aid tips that didn't involve bending from them. they've served them well, considering how often they get injured. considering how often chaeyoung gets injured.

 

"what exactly were you doing, again?" tzuyu sighs, cleaning off chaeyoung's knuckles. chaeyoung is half-asleep and leaning against the side of the lean-to chaeyoung had earthbent for tonight. tzuyu flicks her wrist, encasing chaeyoung's hand in a pocket of air that she quickly turns into a vacuum to keep the wound from getting infected - incorporating her airbending into her healing was a smart idea on tzuyu's part.

 

chaeyoung moans softly as tzuyu lets her wrist drop. tzuyu leans forward to kiss her quickly, gently, coaxing the words from chaeyoung. "there was this fire nation piece of shit."

 

tzuyu's throat squeezes. "a soldier?"

 

the royal fire nation forces are always a frightening sight, no matter where you see them. there are some of them in the rebel ranks, once-loyal soldiers who defected when they saw the tide of the war changing, and their fearsome helmets still manage to strike a chord of fear in tzuyu.

 

"yeah. no. i don't know," chaeyoung shrugs, letting tzuyu kiss her again. tzuyu is always clingier after chaeyoung gets injured, probably out of some primal fear at being reminded that chaeyoung gets injured and beaten up too often for them to have a stable future together. tzuyu is determined to take everything she can get. "she was a dick, though."

 

"you can earthbend," tzuyu sighs, "you don't have to fistfight your way through life."

 

chaeyoung shrugs, a lazy smile on her lips. "worth it."

 

"did you kill her?" tzuyu asks quietly, and chaeyoung shakes her head. "then what if she went back to her base? told all her soldier friends where we were? they could be coming here right now."  

 

the older girl considers it briefly, then kisses tzuyu, "then i guess we better get going."

 

-

 

"withdraw the troops," sana orders, clutching the armrest of her throne so tight her knuckles burn white. she struggles to not let it show.

 

her hands ache with the memory of power, and she longs to feel that same feeling course through her veins again. how good it would feel to be able to firebend just another day, to be free from the shackles that are her war committee and family, her nation. she sits at the helm of a war-machine of a nation, and spends her days like this, cramped up in the throne room as the war rages on, and it's draining her. she feels as if she has aged ten years in the span of six months.

 

a week ago, she would have scoffed at the notion of a _new-age firebender_. a week ago, she was proud to come from a long line of firebenders, to have been able to learn bending techniques developed specifically by her family. it spoke of a legacy - the same legacy she's reminded she has to live up to every time she glances at the walls and the portraits of the fire lords before her. now, that awe has been diminished, replaced by the dulling realization that she wants what she can't have - freedom.

 

fire burns the most wildly when left uncontrolled, and that freedom is a faraway dream to her, at this point. it's people like that renegade traitor im nayeon who have the most power, the most freedom to do whatever they please.   


here, sana's hand is swayed and directed by the whims and fancies of the generals, the commoners, and the politicians who worry about the political implications of a long-lasting war, how this will affect their approval ratings. sana would rather not deal with all of that.  

 

"my lady," general myoui says, stiff-lipped and hard-eyed. right from the start, sana knew that it absolutely killed the general of her armies to address someone she respected so little with so much reverence. general myoui comes from old money, too, and her family has long ties with the royal family. her loyalty, unfortunately, lies with sana's father, and not sana. "wouldn't it be better to press on? we have omashu in everything but spirit. our troops occupy every inch of the city."

 

_spirit._

 

"supplies are running low, are they not?" sana asks, not bothering for an answer because she knows she's right. general yoo jeongyeon had written in a recent war report that they were running out of supplies and low on morale. sana also knows for a fact that general myoui had done her best to hide said report from sana's eyes and sent a command down the line for the troops to press on through omashu. "our troops are dying too quickly to justify staying in the city. we have to retreat for a bit, bring their strength back. and then we can fight again."

 

general myoui rises from her seat, "my lady, you're making the situation unnecessarily complicated."

 

"three thousand soldiers have died in the past week due to malnutrition," sana snaps back, pulling general yoo's report out and laying it out on the table. "another three thousand have died from violence resistance and demonstrations by the citizens of omashu. you're right, general - we have omashu in everything but spirit. but spirit is what counts - as long as the citizens are willing to fight, we have a problem."

 

"then kill them!" general myoui explodes, a maniacal light brightening in her eyes. sana can sense the heat emanating from the general, behaviour typical of firebenders (who are famously unable to control their emotions - general myoui tries her best, but there's only so much she can do). worse, she can sense the approval from the other members of the committee.

 

general myoui stabs one of the flag markers into the shape of omashu on the map of the earth kingdom. her voice rises giddily, and sana watches her spiral as she outlines her plans, "general yoo has been too sparing in her tactics. if we make an example of the citizens, hold public executions, use our weapons on them, they'll learn not to rebel. and then-"

 

" _enough_!" sana snarls, fire exploding in her hands. it's sudden enough to startle all of the assembled generals, and general myoui totters a few steps back in shock. sana hates this, hates using her power and authority to intimidate her subordinates into submission, but if she has to, she will. it is, after all, too easy to fall into her old ways, and even as she glares the general down, fire burning in her hands, she feels liberated.

 

general myoui takes a seat, and sana inhales deeply. she lets the orange flames in her hands die down.  

 

"withdraw the troops from omashu. this is an order." general myoui is still staring at her defiantly, so sana does the same, "is that understood, general?"

 

slowly, trembling, furious, general myoui nods, and sana knows she has only exacerbated their tense relationship. general myoui is the smartest of the generals - which is why she was promoted before anyone else - but her intellect may be what drives her against sana. she sees past the lies better than most, has her own doctrine that she follows that sana still can't quite figure out.

 

but as long as sana can keep her pinned, she'll stay contained, and sana will stay in power.

 

-

 

nayeon wasn't always a treasonous, backstabbing, deserting traitor to the fire nation. once, she was once a captain in the fire nation navy, commanding her own fleet of ships and leading the conquest and occupation of the southern water tribes. she had been up for a fast-tracked promotion to commander once she took down the southern water tribes. they had fallen to her careful tactics and planning, and her strategical eye no other general possessed. now, they say that the new belle of the ball is general myoui mina, whose intelligence easily rivals nayeon's, but that's not true. nayeon is the greatest asset the fire nation ever had, and they lost her.

 

or that's the way she tells the story when people ask. and boy, do people ask. since she went on the run, bouncing from rebel base to rebel base, she's picked up a few changes of clothes, but the ones she wears the most often are the light military uniforms issued by the fire nation itself. she's almost always welcomed into rebel bases with open arms once they realize that she's deserted the enemy, and thus, is a good source of information for them.

 

"i'll be part of the army that liberates the water tribes one day," she says ruefully, "i regret everything that's been done to them. if i'd known what i could do..." she pauses thoughtfully, staring into the distance, and some of the girls crowded around her swoon. nayeon only smirks - this always works.

 

"but now," she promises, "i'll fight. i'll fight to the bitter end no matter what."

 

there's applause, and nayeon nods in thanks. she would take a bow if it wasn't too excessive.

 

-

 

"i can't believe that girl fistfought you," jihyo sighs, her back aching with the exertion of carrying both her own and dahyun's backpacks. dahyun hobbles along pitifully behind her, detailing her exploits and her experience with the assailant she now deems _the earthbender in the forest_.

 

"y'know," dahyun muses, "i could've avoided that entire thing if i just told her i wasn't fire nation."

 

jihyo rolls her eyes. they're both in fire nation soldier garb - nabbed from the soldiers in omashu before they left - and have been in the same clothes for days at this point, just needing to get to the nearest rebel outpost. a part of her still can't believe dahyun's plan worked. getting the outfits off the soldiers had been surprisingly easy - all they had had to do was to flutter their lashes and ask nicely when a troupe of soldiers showed up at jihyo's family's tea shop.

 

the rest, as they say, is history - the troops occupying the city are not good at border protection. jihyo and dahyun had managed to slip out of omashu without a problem, taking whatever belongings they had and getting the hell out of dodge.

 

"and then we wouldn't be here," dahyun continues, "with you carrying my stuff and me being so injured."

 

"ugh, enough."

 

-

 

jeongyeon is finishing up another war report to be sent home when the door to her tent opens.

 

"momo," she grumbles, looking up, "i told you to knock-"

 

"missed me?"

 

she drops her pen. "i could have you arrested and executed for desertion right now."

 

"right," nayeon grins, fire already dancing on her fingertips, "but that would be a dick move, right?"  


	42. Chapter 42

"there's so much light in you, and you don't see it," sana says harshly, and there are tears welling up in her eyes and she can't see properly. her words are fuelled by the painful heat in her gut, she's so angry and she hates this side of herself, the part that's aggressive and impulsive. more than that, she hates momo for doing this to herself. "stop telling yourself that you're fucked up and that you fuck everything up, because it isn't true."

 

she didn't realize she was holding her breath - she exhales, angry, exhaustion rimming her eyes, and glares at momo. waiting for her to say something, like how she can't help it because she's a child of hades. she prepares her rebuttals. she'll do anything to prove her point.

 

momo says nothing, just stares ashamedly at her feet beneath sana's gaze, shrinking into herself. running away. it's a jarring reminder to how fragile momo is. she doesn't fight back because she doesn't want to, because she wants to make the people around her happy. she's scared of what they might say.

 

and sana took that knowledge, turned it around, told momo everything she was afraid of hearing. a sick feeling punches her in the gut, but she lurches forward, she has to say this, "you aren't your father, momo."

 

the ground is trembling almost imperceptibly, and there's a flush creeping up momo's neck. she's getting agitated, but she looks almost ashamed as her powers come into effect.

 

"everyone here is scared of me," she says softly.

 

"no, we're not." it rings hollow. " _i'm_ not."

 

"but you-" momo stops, squeezing her eyes shut, but sana knows what she was going to say.

 

_but you're just one person. what good are you?_

the truth is that sana doesn't _know._


	43. Chapter 43

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyway i love gritty cop aus

when the time comes, nayeon doesn't get the redemption arc she wants. her arc is yoo jeongyeon storming into the bar she's in and demanding that she come with.

 

she has never been one to squander an opportunity, though.

 

"tough shit," nayeon scoffs, "i thought you didn't want me around anymore."

 

"yeah, if i had my way you wouldn't be out of suspension for another year," jeongyeon snaps back, her fist flexing, "but the captain asked for it. fuckin' A."

 

"you kiss sana with that mouth?"

 

jeongyeon rolls her eyes, and nayeon grins back, hefting her legs off the table. the newest crowd of low-lifes she's chosen to surround herself with are equal parts confused and angry - some of them are itching for the chance to beat down a cop. like, a _real_ cop. nayeon's fine because she's a _disgraced_ cop, you see, and that's different.

 

but she's not in the mood to watch a fight. if this was two months ago, when she was still furious and bitter and determined never to speak to anyone from the precinct again, she would gladly shove jeongyeon down against those chairs behind her.

 

or maybe she wouldn't. nayeon's mind is a fickle thing.  

 

"duty calls, boys," she winks, pulling on her jacket and trotting after jeongyeon, who seems to want to get out of this place as quick as possible.

 

"i fucking hate you," jeongyeon snaps, not looking back, knowing full well that nayeon's listening to every word out of her mouth. they've always had that sort of adorable relationship, ever since they graduated the academy together. "i hate what you've done to yourself."

 

nayeon pretends not to hear.

 

"there's been another murder, same M.O. i told jihyo that i could work the case alone, but she insisted-"

 

"how about you cut the crap and admit that you missed me already," nayeon interrupts as they approach jeongyeon's cruiser.

 

it happens so fast that nayeon's blindsided - jeongyeon grabs her and pulls her close, squeezing so tight nayeon chokes. then she realizes that she's meant to hug back, and so she does. jeongyeon is breathing harshly, holds onto nayeon longer than she's accustomed to.  

 

"i can't forgive you yet," jeongyeon mutters in her ear, "but i'm going to try. for jihyo's sake."

 

 _jihyo_ this, _jihyo_ that, nayeon rolls her eyes, but it's a start. she pats jeongyeon on the back and steps from the embrace. sticks her thumbs in her pockets and grins. 

 

"jihyo better be ready for the ass-kissing of her life."

 

-

 

jihyo, as it turns out, is not ready.

 

"you just missed her," dahyun tells her, sealing up the evidence bags with gloved fingers. chaeyoung is fiddling with her camera beside her, sending the shots back to headquarters and up into the cloud. "she has a bunch of meetings this afternoon."

 

"oh," nayeon winces, "that's not a good thing."

 

"yep." jihyo gets notoriously high-strung whenever she has meetings scheduled, and is equally high-strung regardless of the importance of the meeting. she once yelled at nayeon for walking in on a telephone conversation with her mother. something about having set in stone, and having to fulfil expectations, makes jihyo nervy and irritable. "she was even more annoyed just now. though that was chaeng's fault."

 

"hey!" chaeyoung pouts, "everyone forgets to take off the lens cap once in a while."

 

"i assure you, they do not."

 

nayeon shifts, suddenly nervous. she hadn't thought much of it on the way here, just busied herself with playing with the windows in jeongyeon's car until jeongyeon put them under kiddie lock. she then turned her attention to the sunroof, which is now also locked. coming back to the force hadn't seemed like such a big thing, back then.

 

she figured it wouldn't be a seamless transition, but this is getting bigger than she expected. she remembers how angry jihyo was when she got suspended, and mutters, "maybe i should come back tomorrow."  

 

dahyun shakes her head, "i don't think so. i think her bad mood has something to do with you."

 

"gee, thanks, dahyun." nayeon shakes her head, stepping away from the two forensics investigators, "i'm just gonna look at the case."

 

"that's not what i meant!" dahyun hollers, then collects herself when passing detectives give her weird looks.

 

"she's in a bad mood because life's been hell without you to work your wonder-detective dust all over it. she misses you, so go and see her."

 

-

 

"the link is simple. they're all redheads. look at the profiles - cherry, ginger, whatever. our killer is going after redheads."

 

they stop at a drive-thru, jeongyeon relaying their coffee orders flawlessly to the cashier. (nayeon is unsurprised that she remembers - if five years of living together hadn't hammered nayeon's preferences into jeongyeon's head, then they might as well have been for nothing.)

 

a few files slide off nayeon's lap when the car moves forward, and she leans down, squinting at a new detail she hadn't noticed, "have we tried tracing the source of the masks?"

 

"yeah." jeongyeon passes her the coffee, "as i said, we've been working this case for months. tzuyu followed up on the source of the masks, but we hit a dead end - all their buyers either had alibis or couldn't be contacted. everything's stagnated since then."

 

"which is why you called me in," nayeon chuckles, recalling what dahyun had said. "you're desperate for my wonder-detective dust?"

 

"that's not how i would put it," jeongyeon sighs.

 

nayeon grins even wider, "it's true though!"  

 

the younger woman sighs again, her hands tightening on the steering wheel, as if she's considering just unlocking the kiddie-locked doors and letting nayeon walk back to the precinct on her own. "you're right that we're desperate, though. jihyo's risking her job bringing you back."

 

it dawns on nayeon, "so the pressure's on me to bring us a win."

 

"you," jeongyeon says knowingly, sitting back in her seat, "and jihyo."

 

-

 

few heads are raised when nayeon returns to the precinct. given recent circumstances, morale is low, and everyone was kind of expecting nayeon to return early anyway. it makes for quite a drab atmosphere. she's still happy, though, gladly receiving the high-fives the lab technicians wonpil and jaehyung offer her on her way upstairs. she doesn't even get annoyed with the close button in the elevator that takes a well-aimed punch to light up - it's a part of life! who is she to get irritated?

 

"i love this," she grins, clapping jeongyeon on the back way too hard. "it feels just like old times."

 

"hmm," jeongyeon hums, but says nothing more.

 

jeongyeon leaves her to her own devices, and she sets her stuff down on her desk. it's exactly like how she remembers it - messy, but in a charming sort of way. and then she looks around at her squad, and frowns.

 

mina has her headphones in and is crouched over her monitor, typing furiously. tzuyu and sana have their heads together and are discussing something with furrowed brows and frowns on their faces. jeongyeon, meanwhile, pretty much melts into her chair when she takes her seat.

 

this feels different. just how much has changed without her?

 

"oh, hey nayeon!" momo chirps, backhugging her tightly out of nowhere, and nayeon smiles. she can always count on momo to lift her spirits. the captain's assistant looks less happy than she did the last time nayeon saw her, but it's miles better than anyone on the squad, and nayeon is slightly worried that even momo's been shaken by the case. "the captain asked for a two-o-clock meeting, with the whole squad. that means you, now!"

 

"yeah," nayeon replies, "i guess it does."

 

"briefing room, two pm," momo smiles, and hugs her again, "it's good to have you back."

 

-

 

at two pm, she walks into the briefing room, gun and badge with her. she'd headed down to the armory and gotten back both (not without copious amounts of forms to fill out, and a very hard look from the officer working there who'd _definitely_ heard of her), and is now holding on to it for dear life.

 

she'd missed the weight of both - it might be purely psychological, but they make her feel complete, like she's getting to do her job. no one brings their gun and badge to a briefing, but she decides not to let anyone tell her how to do things. the circumstances of her return have been so sudden that it didn't properly sink in until after she'd gotten them back.

 

(a part of her knew that these would be the circumstances she returned under. she was never much of a hero.)

 

mina, forever the most punctual member of their squad (she has a certificate on her desk deeming her 'Most Proper Member of the Squad'. it had been a gag gift from jeongyeon, but mina had actually cried when receiving it), is already there. tzuyu comes in a few minutes later, pausing from her case files to greet nayeon with the typical tzuyu stiffness. momo comes too, if just to beam at nayeon and ask how all of them are doing, "we rarely get to do this!"

 

the door opens at two minutes past two, and in strides jihyo.

 

nayeon's breath catches.

 

the captain takes her time setting up, greeting all of them and making small talk with mina and momo, asking them about their weekend plans even though it's only tuesday. she's distracted, and the two seem to realize this, humoring her with obviously false answers after the third time jihyo goes 'uh huh' and nods vigorously.

 

"and then we're going to go hunt for narwhals," mina says dryly, "we're going to build our own spears out of narwhal horns."

 

"uh huh," jihyo nods, "that's so cool! what else are you going to do?"

 

"cook a cauldron of soup and drink all of it."

 

"nice, i'd do that too-"

 

"sorry we're late," sana squeaks, hair a disheveled mess as she stumbles into the briefing room. jeongyeon comes in a respectful five seconds later, hair also a mess but less obvious, because you know, short hair. "we got caught up with something."

 

"was that something kissing in jihyo's office?" tzuyu asks, and smirks when jeongyeon gives her a horrified look. "yep. we all know."

 

sana and jeongyeon take their seats across the room from each other as jihyo continues busying herself with whatever she's doing. nayeon is left to watch and nervously make eye contact with her squadmates, as if to ask _is this really happening?_

 

"nice," jihyo replies, nodding hard, "that's something i wanna give a try too."

 

momo sighs, "captain."

 

"tell me about it," the captain sighs, rummaging through her briefcase.

 

"captain!"

 

jihyo blinks, finally snapped out of her reverie. "oh, yes. let's start the briefing. i called for this meeting to inform everyone that detective im is now back on the force. she'll be working the case with all of us now. provide her with all the updates she needs."

 

there's an expectant pause, and jihyo shrugs, "that's it. meeting adjourned."

 

disappointed but not surprised - jihyo was always one to get straight to the point - nayeon gets up from her seat, crossing the room to sana. sana has a big brain full of secrets and an equally large mouth, so nayeon can always count on her to get her up to speed. specifically on things like the captain's wavering moods.

 

(or maybe she won't be able to, because it's always been nayeon who knows jihyo best.)

 

"detective im," comes jihyo's voice, stopping nayeon in her tracks. sana raises her eyebrows at her as she passes her. "may i speak with you in my office?"  


	44. Chapter 44

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sahyo........... pubg..... au

they're stashed away in a three-storey house that, for all intents and purposes, had already been ransacked when they arrive. they don't need any more weapons, though - jihyo had tossed sana a gun from her rucksack (there is _no way_ something that big could've fit into jihyo's pack) and told her to lay low.

 

"let them get rid of each other," she tells sana, grimly watching the gunfight happen in front of them. sana surges up to watch, too, but jihyo pulls her back down harshly. "and stay out of sight."

 

sana squirms. jihyo speaks with an aged maturity, as if she knows more about the game than everyone else. she gets the feeling that she should listen to what she has to say. still, staying in this building is creeping her out, making her feel exposed. what if someone comes up the steps and takes both of them out? worse off, what if an entire bunch of allied players come and finish them off? the thought makes the blood in her ears pound.

  
"we'll be safe here," jihyo mutters, as if she'd read her mind. "no one ever comes here, not in the first few hours."

 

the door to the house slams open, and another player, naked as the day he was born, races up the stairs. jihyo coolly pivots her rifle and clips him five times in the chest. his body disappears, replaced by a simple brown crate. sana knows, on an instinctual level, that there'll be nothing useful in there.

 

"some people come here," jihyo amends, smirking, and sana knows they're going to be safe. for now.


	45. Chapter 45

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> set in the last to fall / space au universe...... backstory for this was that: momo goes missing on a mission and sana is determined to look for her, even when everyone tells her that momo's dead

sana's morning routine was the first thing she learnt to hate. she was five when she first decided she wasn't going to wake up with the rest of the apollo-jupiter satellite like all the other good boys and girls on the ship, simply because she hated the idea of being the same as everyone else. jihyo's father had been the one to lure her to the bathroom to clean her teeth and get dressed with the promise of an entire bag of venus-rocks all to herself.

 

despite his best efforts, bless his heart, they backfired on him. she later realized that she could get anything she wanted by refusing to get out of bed, starting a twenty-year long crusade of refusing to abide by the station's rules. she'd abided by the rigid schedule during the two years she was in the academy, but that's it.

 

sana _hates_ routine. which is why everything feels wrong now. because at the crack of dawn, when the buzzer goes, she wakes up with the rest of the station. gets dressed and splashes water on her face to wake herself up. pulls on her uniform and walks straight past the mess hall, into her office.

 

the door slides shut with a hiss behind her, and she massages her temples, squeezing her eyes shut. her head pricks and hurts all around, behind her ears, above her eyes, undoubtedly a result of how late she'd slept last night. working on the same case. she doesn't care.

 

jihyo is waiting for her today, leaning against the mahogany desk. she looks up when sana comes in, and sana knows that look.

 

"have you eaten?"

 

"no."

 

"do you want anything?"

 

sana waves her off, striding to her desk, "it's okay. i'm just going to get to work."

 

jihyo frowns, light glinting off the medals on her chest when she shifts. sana squints. "when was the last time you ate?"

 

"i dunno."

 

"not an answer. come on," she grabs sana by the elbow, "you have to eat."  

 


	46. Chapter 46

Sana looks up, and Momo has to struggle not to retch on the spot.

 

This is a new record - the pile of bodies in front of Sana, the gore around her mouth and the look in her eyes sends a chill up Momo's spine. She's seen ghouls in the gr­­­ip of their bloodlust, fought them off without so much as a sweat, but the sight of this destabilizes her. Sana is no different from any of the ghouls Momo has fought. She's as insane, as murderous as the rest of her kind.

 

She steels herself, drawing her gun. It's been filled with bullets made of thorium - the only known element capable of incapacitating and destroying the ghouls from within. As a budding investigator in the Academy, she hadn't been one for the scientifics. Mina, on the other hand, extensively researched the use of thorium in the investigators' guns, and is working in another branch to find a better substitute. It's work Momo could never do.

 

This, however - pointing a gun straight at the ghoul who's crouched over a total of ten human bodies - is what she was made for. Her heart pounds in her ears, but her hands do not shake. She's done this enough to know how it will go down.

 

She'll level her gun at the ghoul.

 

She'll pull the trigger just as the ghoul charges her.

 

And she will watch as they disintegrate into ash and dust, consumed by the pain of the bullet in their flesh-

 

She's thrown backwards by Sana's weight in her chest. The gun spins out of her hand, clattering onto the ground, but she can't stop to mourn it, she has to get out of her, she can't be the next body in that pile-

 

Sana's teeth are in her-

 

Her shoulder's being ripped apart-

 

She's going, going she's-


	47. Chapter 47

She leans over the unconscious man, and drinks. Nayeon can't see her well in the dim light of the alley, but she knows what's happening. Sana is drinking, the despicable vampire and her horrible, monstrous ways - she doesn't regard humans as anywhere equal to her. How could she, when she is so much stronger, faster, so much more powerful than any human alive?

                                 

Still - it's an interesting prospect. Because right now, Sana is vulnerable, completely taken with feeding on the man. Nayeon is standing over her, sharp nails digging into her palms, and she could dig these nails into the back of Sana's neck. With some luck, she'd be able to overpower her, use the light of the morning star against her. It's almost dawn. Nayeon's mouth is dry with the thought of it.

 

The seconds that pass feel closer to hours as she watches Sana feed, the sinful, awful, enthralling thoughts rushing through her mind.

 

She could do it. She could put an end to all of this. Nayeon would be free to roam the world as she pleases, free from the clutches of the vampire who turned her.

 

And then - what? She has no clue how the vampire blood - _Sana's_ blood - in her veins will continue to transform her. She'd woken up the morning after being turned with a throbbing headache and an immense new strength in her body. The day after that, her teeth and nails had hardened and sharpened, and she'd sprinted over to Sana the moment night fell to demand an explanation.

  
(Just file them down, Sana had explained with a roll of her eyes, it's not that big of a deal.)

 

She hates Sana for doing this to her, but she _needs_ her to guide her. New, frightening changes crop up all the time, and Nayeon doesn't want to be clueless when they happen.

  
She relaxes, exhaling slowly as Sana finishes up, wiping her mouth clean.

 

"Do you want some?"  

 

Nayeon forces a smile, "Nope."

 

-

 

"Why didn't you do it?" Sana asks quietly. "That night."

  
"What are you talking about?"

 

The most imperceptible of smirks flits across Sana's face. "You know what I mean. That night in the alley, the first night I took you hunting."

 

Nayeon huffs, "You were useful to keep around."

 

"Is that all?"

 

"Why..." Nayeon growls, but her expression relaxes when she sees Sana grinning like a fool. "Yes."

 

"You know, for a dhampir, you can be pretty damn human." Nayeon rolls her eyes, "But it's good. I like that about you."

 

"I don't give a shit."

 

Sana laughs.

 

 


	48. Chapter 48

_Two demigods walk into each other. The first one says, "Watch where you're going." And the second one charges a bolt of lightning in her hands and sends the first one flying back into the river._

Sana has approximately one nanosecond to comprehend the biggest wave of water she's seen in her life arcing over her before it crashes down on her. Water rushes up her nose and rolls her body back, and she groans, her body jerking and sending another jolt of electricity through the water. (She takes a moment to feel sorry for whichever fish were in there - water is, unfortunately, a brilliant conductor of electricity.)

 

Goddamn it. She has to remember that water is Mina's element. Preferably she wouldn't, because Mina is a garbage demigod with garbage water powers that she uses to disrupt Sana's already-garbage life. The water rushes around her before the current swells to pin her to the riverbed, and Sana's eyes burn with the strain of keeping them open.

 

Mina appears, grinning down at her, and Sana gets so irritated she blasts enough lightning to vaporize the water keeping her down into steam. She flies back up and grabs Mina by the collar, the younger girl's eyes widening and her control over the river relenting as Sana tackles her to the ground, "Hey--!"

 

"Shut it," Sana tells her, before kissing her roughly. Mina only grins savagely before kissing Sana back with as much fervor, tangling her fingers in the older girl's hair and rolling them over so she can climb on top of Sana. Demigods have this thing - Mina is better at controlling it than Sana, but only marginally - where their control over their respective powers weakens when they get emotional. Horniness is an emotion, right?

 

Right.

 

So it's no surprise that storm clouds begin to gather above the two of them. The river has grown to a wild, thrashing behemoth, and there are little sparks bouncing off Sana and getting on the ground as she kisses Mina. It's a sight to behold, certainly.

  
And then Nayeon comes across them, and folds her arms. "Guys, we're on a quest."

 

Mina jerks away from Sana, looking appropriately ashamed. "Sorry, unnie."

 

Nayeon shakes her head, smirking as Jeongyeon arrives, undoubtedly having made up her mind to retell the entire story to Jeongyeon. Sana-and-Mina stories are a dime a dozen with Nayeon, mostly to cover up the equally embarrassing Nayeon-and-Jeongyeon ones. "Do you two do this often, or is this a one-time thing?"

 

"I, uh," Mina stammers, but Sana decides to be helpful.

 

"All the time. She finds it hot when I can pin her down."

 

"You did _not_ have me pinned down, unnie," retorts the younger girl, not bothering to refute the rest of Sana's claim, "I would've won if you didn't kiss me first."

 

Sparks fly, literally, as Sana gazes at Mina. "Are you so sure about that?"

 

Nayeon asks exasperatedly, "Your godly parents bless you with these powers and you use them to rile each other up?"

 

"Nayeon, leave us alone for a little while."

 

"Am I being sexiled right now? Oh, my God, Jeong, I'm getting sexiled."

 

Then Sana lunges at Mina, that same blinding power crackling at her fingertips, and Mina grins and raises the river.


	49. Chapter 49

_i remember, baby come home_

-

her fingers press against the bruises on jihyo's hip, the ugly gash on her abdomen where jeongyeon had slashed her, and she frowns. she does not speak, though, simply continues touching her. she's warm, and jihyo has to resist the urge to press more firmly against her. they stay like this for a good few minutes, sana simply looking her up and down and feeling the scars against her skin. jihyo wants to do the same, but she doesn't know if sana would mind.

 

there is just something raw and intimate about being able to touch each other like this, away from the prying eyes of the empress and the rest of the court. in this space, they are not the gladiators that their patrons bet their life savings on, but just sana and jihyo.

 

 _let's run away,_ jihyo mouths, before pressing their lips together. as sana exhales, her eyes fluttering shut, jihyo continues thinking furiously. as if her silent prayer could result in real-life changes. she is quiet, but she thinks, _let's get out of this awful place. we can take a ride in a farmer's cart as he heads to the city, and we will sneak out before he reports us to the authorities. it will be difficult but rewarding. do this with me, because there is no one else i would want to go with._

sana pulls away first, fingertips brushing at jihyo's arms. she laughs lowly, breathless, "what was that for?"

 

"i just wanted to do it," is jihyo's reply, and sana laughs delightedly.  

 

"cute," sana grins, and kisses her again. and again, until jihyo is falling, away from this world.

 

this world - where it isn't nice to be a person, let alone a gladiator in the empress' personal armada of performative fighters - is the one they exist in, and jihyo is pulled back by the gentle sigh sana lets out. "i have to go soon. there's a fight in two hours."

 

jihyo whines, but sana only smiles sadly.  

 

-

 

the empress eyes her icily, "you're literate?"

 

jihyo nods slowly, the indignant fire in her painful and searing. she wants to leap up the steps, and knows she could get to the empress' throat before the guards flanking her could even react. she could take them down, easy, and rome would be better off for it. then she could drag her _gladius_ across the empress' neck, and then what?

 

then she would run off with sana, and they would be gone, away from here, away from themselves.

 

-

 

jihyo is sitting cross-legged in mina's study, a book resting on her lap. she traces the words with careful precision - she loses track of them, with hundreds of words on just one page - taking in all the information it has to offer.

 

mina is kind enough to offer her library as a sanctuary of sorts to jihyo. as one of jihyo's biggest patrons, mina has control over how jihyo spends some of her time. jihyo needs no coercion to be here. it is highly preferable to meeting her other patrons and doing menial tasks for them, or engaging them in conversation over topics she couldn't possibly have any interest in.

 

the door flies open, and jihyo reflexively shuts the book in fear. it's mina.

 

"jihyo," she gasps, hands on her knees, face flushed, nowhere as put-together as she always is. "jihyo, the empress- she- she-"

 

jihyo stands immediately, shelving the book. her heart is racing, and her only thoughts are of sana. this feels like a culmination of the tension from the past weeks, and though jihyo knew this might come, she doesn't actually want to believe it now. "what is it?"

 

"she- she called for a death match. it's sana." mina gulps. "she wants sana to fight in the death match."

 


	50. i do it for the glory

The heat comes in waves, and always in the evening. Some say it's a ripple effect from the sun setting, and others say it's the firebenders getting in one last bout of practice before the moon comes up for good. Either way, it's a bitch to deal with, and Sana finds herself strolling the length of the beach to cool off most days. The proximity to water doesn't hurt, either - most benders are recharged just by being near their element, and Sana is no exception. (It also explains why most firebenders are perpetually sunburnt.)

 

There are footsteps behind her. She only has to half-turn before a familiar figure is pressed up against her, her hand slipping into Sana's.

 

"Out so late, my lady?" and Sana can hear the grin in Nayeon's voice. Everything about her has been blessed by flame - her low voice, her touch, even the aura she radiates is warm, comforting, passionate. Sana, in contrast, is peaceful but not defenseless, powerful but not restless, and the total opposite of what Nayeon is.

 

She doesn't hate it. She never has. "I could say the same for you. Why are you here?"

 

"Is seeing you not good enough of a reason?" Nayeon laughs, and turns Sana to face her. She holds Sana's face in her hands, her adoring eyes reflecting the light of the sunset, "I was here for practice."

 

Sana stiffens, and Nayeon frowns in response. Sana isn't really sure what else she expected, though - Sana is, and has always been firmly against Nayeon's involvement in the bending competitions.

 

Firebending is an inherently destructive sport, and Sana finds the commercialization of firebending duels risky and stupid. She's made all of that clear to Nayeon, despite the latter's protests that it really isn't _that_ bad. Sana doesn't believe it, not for a second. Nayeon seems to have a self-destructive streak in her that demands she find new and novel ways to drive herself to an early grave. It's killing both of them.  

 

"Do you want to come to my match?" Nayeon blurts out, breaking eye contact and glancing at the ground nervously. She still has Sana's cheeks cupped against her palms, and she presses, "I know you don't like it, but I think it'd be interesting-"

 

Sana kisses her, dropping Nayeon's hands from her face and pressing up against her. With a heavy sigh, Nayeon kisses back, and they lose themselves in the inky light, kissing languidly until they lose their breath.

 

"This has to be the last one," Sana hisses, gripping onto Nayeon's hips. Nayeon is still dazed, blinking at her, "No more. I can't lose you."


	51. Chapter 51

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was inspired by an ask on thothirai's blog ++ had an outline for this that involved mini drabbles about samo + namo + samoyeon to wrap it up ........ but i got lazy........... its a cute concept tho

There's a pot of daturas on Momo's desk. They flower only at night, and are as beautiful as they are poisonous, their white leaves full and swollen. The note attached to the pot has two sets of handwriting - one messy, one neater, both evidently scrawled in a hurry, warning her of just how dangerous the daturas can be if ingested, and begging Momo to please not do that.

 

She likes picturing the circumstances in which the note was written. They probably picked the flowers together, but Nayeon would've been the one to actually buy them from the store. They would've agreed to split the cost of the flowers, but Sana probably has yet to pay Nayeon back. Sana probably suggested that they use her special glittery post-its to write the note. Nayeon probably insisted that she get dibs on writing because she paid for the flowers, and Sana would've stuck her tongue out at her and gotten to work on the note.

 

Nayeon would then shove Sana aside and speed off with the note in hand, no doubt using some of that superhuman speed she's been blessed with. Sana, not one to be bested, would take off in hot pursuit, and they'd crash into a wall and end up kissing somewhere, fangs clashing and, within a few minutes, tearing at each other's clothes. The note would lay forgotten until it was actually almost time to hand the gift to Momo, which explains why it looks so rushed.

 

Momo really doesn't mind. It's the most Sana-and-Nayeon thing that could have happened, and she's reminded of how much she loves them when she looks at the flowers. 

 

Long ago, before the three of them were a thing, Momo used to think that if there was one thing Nayeon and Sana loved more than her, it would be each other. The three of them go way back, but Nayeon and Sana have a certain relationship. It's not just the inexplicable bond that all vampires share, but a deep, intimate understanding of each other. It's just as deep as Nayeon and Momo's, or Sana and Momo's, but it's just... different.

 

It turned out that Nayeon didn't know the daturas were poisonous. Sana had been the one to break it to her, having put copious amounts of thought into the matter (Nayeon's rationale for the selection was the beauty of the flowers, "I'm a shallow girl! So what?") and having researched them thoroughly. If Momo was the type of lycan who never aged out of her teething phase, she might've died. 

 

Thankfully, she isn't three years old, so she was fine.

 

-

 

**one - nayeon and sana**

 

A seventeen year-old Sana wakes up in a cold sweat, tears immediately springing to her eyes from the pain. It's radiating from her stomach and scorching in her throat, swelling and expanding in her windpipe - it's hard to breathe. She curls up in her bed, nails digging into her thighs, but it's no use.

 

In the bunk above hers, Nayeon groans and turns onto her side, still blissfully asleep. Sana has to bite her hand to muffle her groan when the next bolt of nausea tears through her.

 

Her parents had tried her best to prepare Sana for her first ever bout of moonsickness, but no one can really prepare you for it. It's just something you have to sit through, and it sucks, but everyone gets through it. Not now, though. Sana is crying, because her stomach hurts and she's shivering and she is so _so thirsty_ -

 

She chokes at the thought. She's never had the chance to drink from a live person, and like everyone else her age, has been fed from only bottled and prepared sources of blood. The thought of drinking from an actual person is equal parts terrifying and electrifying.

 

Nayeon shifts again, suddenly fully awake. She must realize something is different, because she sits up immediately, "Sana?"

 

Sana whimpers at the call of her name, "Unnie-"

 

"Is it the sickness?" Nayeon's voice is still raspy with sleep, but Sana can hear the concern beneath it. "Can I get you some painkillers?"

 

Another wave of pain, and Sana writhes, breathing so shallowly that she sees black spots in her vision. Nayeon clambers down the ladder linking their beds, pressing into Sana's mattress, looking down with soft eyes.

 

"It hurts," Sana moans, and stiffens when Nayeon comes closer. The look in Nayeon's eyes is uncertain, but Sana thinks she knows what Nayeon is going to do. She figures it must be something people do often - offer their necks up to vampires going through moonsickness so they aren't terrible, noisy roommates.

 

"Come here," Nayeon whispers, imperceptibly, and pulls Sana close. Sana's fangs sink into Nayeon's neck before she has a chance to tell her what to do.

 

Nayeon only relaxes, focusing on her breathing and petting Sana's hair as the younger girl drinks greedily from her.

 

Nayeon is Sana's first bite. She wouldn't rather anyone else.


	52. Chapter 52

Every summer, something big and unforgettable happens.

 

Their first summer together, in the year they all turned fourteen, was when it started. Sana and Jeongyeon found an old spellbook in the woods, and consequently got half the camp to fall in love with Sana. It took dedicated weeks with the enchanted spellbook to figure out the spell that would reverse it, with even Sana admitting later that the constant adoration from everyone got tiring.

 

That had ended with a confession from Jeongyeon ("I don't need a spell to know that I like you, Sana") that had led to Sana and Jeongyeon dating for the next six and a half months. They maintain that they have no regrets.

 

The second summer was the summer Chaeyoung pissed off the goddess Persephone by using one of her sacred bats as target practice. The results were disastrous, to say the least - the camp got shrouded by a dark mist until they successfully soothed Persephone's temper, with that summer boasting a record number of rainy days. The nine of them had just crowded into Dahyun's cabin and played cards the entire time, not-so-subtly shooting looks at Chaeyoung for getting them into this mess in the first place.

 

Eventually, the demeter kids came to complain about the rain's effect on their crops, and Chaeyoung begged Tzuyu to call in a favour from her father. 

 

("You know I'm contractually obligated to hate you now, right?" Tzuyu had sighed the moment Chaeyoung came back looking very guilty, quiver strapped to her back and bow in hand. "You basically just offended my mom.")

 

Chaeyoung's pretty sure Persephone still holds a grudge against her.

 

Their third summer was the one where Mina started to control the full extent of her powers, and realized she could go surfing pretty much as much as she wanted, what with her control over the ocean and all. She promptly surfed her way to the other side of the world, and got stranded on a beach in hawaii. Dahyun had been the one to go get her, coming back with Mina perched on her back and awfully sunburnt.

 

They spent the rest of that summer playing capture the flag, with most of them eventually complaining that any team with Momo on it was vastly overpowered and that they should make Momo sit out entirely. That resolution didn't last, obviously, because all it had taken was a pout from Momo to change their minds. Momo has always had an effect on all of them.

 

They all turned seventeen their fourth summer, and Nayeon had taken it as a cue to ask Jihyo out, reasoning that "This is the year we're supposed to be doing things, right?" Jihyo reassured her that no, there is no rule in any book that declares that, but yes, she'd date Nayeon.

 

That wasn't the big event of the summer - the asking out was. Nayeon terrorized the remaining seven girls the entire summer on what to do to make Jihyo like her more, asking what she could do to make Jihyo like her more. That had been met with plenty of eyerolls and comments of she likes you so much, Nayeon, just go for it. True to her father's domain, Nayeon had looked slightly insane that entire summer.

 

She'd eventually asked Jihyo out by way of a massive billboard carried by a pack of greek leopards. The relief she felt when Jihyo said yes? Incredible, but not comparable to the trouble she got into with Dionysus for abusing her powers to summon a pack of leopards.

 

Doesn't matter, she got what she wanted.

 

They start their fifth summer as if it's their last. And things start as they always do - with Chaeyoung shooting an arrow. 

 

-

 

Mina has never gotten the hang of skipping stones. Momo has given countless hours of advice, as passionate of a stone-skipper as she is, ranging from you have to get flat stones, not these rocks- Minari, don't lift them like that, you'll hurt your back! To you have to roll your wrist, like you're throwing a spear.

 

To which Mina had asked, why would I ever throw a spear? And Momo shrugged and replied that it happens.

 

Unlike her, Momo took to it like a fish to water.

 

Momo spent almost the entirety of their first week at camp skipping stones at the lake because she felt too awkward to socialize with the rest of the camp. Mina, introverted as ever, had retreated to the closest body of water and met Momo collecting stones for her next big skip. That's what Momo calls them - big skips, for the good ones, and bad skips, for the bad ones.

 

This is Mina's favourite place in camp, because she associates it with comfort, safety, and security, refuge when the outside world gets too overwhelming. That, and Momo rolling her wrist to skip her stones, counting them out dutifully. Mina helps out when she can, lazily controlling the water so it's as calm as possible, a conducive environment for Momo's skips.

 

"Twenty," Momo smirks, before frowning and squinting, "Did that last one count? It was too far for me to see."

 

Mina shrugs, "Don't know."

 

Momo hums thoughtfully, "We should get Dahyun here the next time. She could fly above the lake and count for us. Like what they do at the Olympics!"

 

Momo's unbridled optimism makes Mina smile. "I know you're kidding, but on the off-chance that you're not, please don't do that."

 

She leaves the rest unsaid, but Momo gets it, too. This place is their private sanctuary, and has been for the past five years, something that's been shared between the two of them. Momo knows Mina's biggest nightmare would be to get the other seven girls in on this.

 

Momo grins back, "Duh."


	53. Chapter 53

Nayeon doesn't immediately realize that Momo is avoiding them.

 

She spends the next day looking for each of the others, trying her best to clean up the mess. Sana is the easiest to locate. After calling for a break during cheerleading practice, Nayeon takes Sana to the side and says simply, "Tomorrow, after school, my place."  

 

Sana nods, "Okay. Now laugh really hard, like I just said something really funny."

 

Nayeon bursts out laughing and slaps Sana on the back, shoving her off with her a giggle and a knowing smirk after. Sana and Nayeon are one and the same - they've gotten too good at manipulating their public images, gotten too good at changing how they appear to people. It's a gift not granted to many, and they use it to the best of their ability.

 

(Is it deceitful? Yes. Is it wrong? Jury's still out on that.)

 

She brushes up against Jeongyeon in the hallways, telling her the same thing. Jihyo she finds with similar ease, heading to the softball pitch after school and waiting for Jihyo to head to the water fountain.

 

Momo's the one she has trouble finding, which shouldn't be the case, because Nayeon knows her friends like the back of her hand, knows their patterns and their tendencies. Momo can usually reliably be found at one of the dance studios after school, practising with the close-knit dance group she's assembled.

 

"She wasn't here," Chaeyoung, the only underclassman in Momo's dance group, tells Nayeon. "I haven't seen her all day."

 

Nayeon furrows her eyebrows. "Is she replying your texts?"

 

"I wouldn't know, I don't have a phone," Chaeyoung shrugs, walking off, leaving Nayeon to head to the next haunt of Momo's that she knows of. The convenience store where they meet up every morning is a good guess, but it's a lost cause, too. The cashier shakes his head when Nayeon asks if he knows where she is.

 

She decides to buy a chocolate bar for his trouble.

 

She shoots Momo a text, asking politely but firmly where she is and why she hadn't shown up the entire day. She's used to not spending time with the rest of them - they have separate social circles, and would never mix under different circumstances - but Momo's different.

 

Nayeon's worried about her. Worried, because if she knows Momo as well as she does, Momo will have spent the last day losing her mind over what's going on, barely sleeping or drinking because of how heavy it's weighing on her conscience. Nayeon really can't blame her for reacting this way. It's just who Momo is.

 

But as much as Nayeon wants to avoid thinking about it, this isn't just a matter of keeping Momo sane. This isn't as surface-level as the time Momo stole something in sixth grade and felt bad about it.

 

She hates how her heart squeezes at the thought of Momo - because it isn't worry for Momo that she really feels, but fear of how things will turn out for her.

 

Still, she placates herself with thinking that maybe Momo is just taking some time off for herself. Everyone needs time for themselves, especially when something as dire as this has happened.

 

She's always been impatient, though. She ends up asking the others if they've seen her when they finally meet the next day, tired of Momo's lack of replies.

 

The air is solemn and still, and Nayeon feels the pit in her stomach grow as Jeongyeon, Sana and Jihyo file into her bedroom. For a terrible moment, she's forced to relive the events of that night, looking into each of their eyes and knowing the horrible secret they harbour, and has to turn away.

 

The rest aren't looking too good either. Jihyo looks like she's going to throw up, and Nayeon doesn't blame her. Still, she presses on.

 

"She came to class today," Sana says, eyes darting, as if she's afraid someone will see the four of them gathered. "I tried to talk to her after class, but she just ran off."

 

"I saw her, too," volunteers Jeongyeon. She's been picking at the same spot on her jeans for the five past minutes, chewing on her cheek in the distinctive way she always has. And then, she says what's on all of their minds: "I think she's avoiding us."

 

Jihyo follows up immediately, "We need to get her here."  


End file.
